


Gaudy Night

by HiNerdsItsCat (HiLarpItsCat)



Series: Two Can Play At That Game [8]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst and Romance, Chameleon Arch (Doctor Who), Doctor Who Series 12 Spoilers, Dress Up, Everyone lives, F/F, F/M, Fake Marriage, Jenny Smith/Harry Jones - Timeline A, One-Sided Thirteenth Doctor/Yasmin Khan, Other, Post-Season/Series 12 AU, References to previous seasons, Romantic Fluff, School Reunion, Spatial Anomaly, St. Luke's University (Doctor Who), Temporal Paradox
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-26
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 01:21:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 37,380
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28343106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HiLarpItsCat/pseuds/HiNerdsItsCat
Summary: (Timeline A)While investigating a temporal anomaly at a manor house in Somerset, the Thirteenth Doctor finds herself at a school reunion for St Luke's University—one organized by none other than the Master. In order to get to the bottom of the mystery and foil his plans, she takes him up on his offer: in exchange for one clue per hour, she has to spend the evening with him as Jenny Smith and Harry Jones.What could go wrong?
Relationships: The Doctor/The Master (Doctor Who), Thirteenth Doctor & Yasmin Khan & Ryan Sinclair, Thirteenth Doctor/The Master (Dhawan), Yasmin Khan & Ryan Sinclair, Yasmin Khan/Original Female Character(s)
Series: Two Can Play At That Game [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1733089
Comments: 63
Kudos: 77





	1. If You Want a Lover

**Author's Note:**

> **Setting:** After the events of the story ["Asynchronous Contact"](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24275761).
> 
> This story takes place in the "Timeline A" version of the ending to _Two Can Play At That Game,_ where the Doctor and the Master go back to being Time Lords/Best Enemies. In the present day, approximately one year has passed since the events of the Series 12 episode "The Timeless Children."

“So let me get this straight,” Ryan said. “We’re going to Somerset.”

“Yes,” the Doctor said, slightly distracted with inputting the coordinates of their destination.

“Because the TARDIS picked up a strange energy reading.”

“Yes.” She flipped a series of switches; two of them flipped back to their original positions.

“But we don’t know what the source of that energy actually _is.”_

“It’s temporal energy.” She held the pair of switches down, frowning as the TARDIS made a somewhat grumbly sound in response.

“And there isn’t any indication of whether it’s good or bad.”

“It’s _weird,”_ the Doctor said. “And when it’s weird, that’s when we go take a look.”

“What’s the plan for when we get there?” Yaz asked. Noticing the Doctor’s struggle with the switches, she asked: “do you need a hand with the controls, Doctor?”

“No,” she said. The TARDIS made another grumbly sound. “Yes,” she admitted. “Wait—” After a third iteration of the TARDIS complaining, the switches stopped fighting her and stayed put. “Anyway, when we get there, we’ll do what we usually do.”

“Wander around until a Thing happens?” Ryan suggested.

“Exactly.”

This time around, it was just the three of them in the TARDIS. Graham had come down with an unexpected headcold and decided that coughing and sneezing his way through an adventure was probably not going to be pleasant for anyone, so he elected to stay home for a few days.

“We’ll bring you back something,” Ryan had promised him before they left, “from… when exactly are we going?” he asked the Doctor.

“2022,” the Doctor supplied.

“Is it weird that going only a year into the future feels like a much stranger trip than when we travel thousands of years into the future?” Yaz asked Ryan on their walk back to the TARDIS.

He shrugged. “A bit, I suppose. It’s like everything’s just a _little_ different.”

“The Uncanny Valley,” the Doctor chimed in from behind them. “When humans encounter something that looks almost human but not quite, it comes off as a bit creepy. That’s why Autons have trouble blending in for very long—humans can tell when something’s off.” She frowned. “Usually. Some people don’t pay attention to _anything_ around them.”

When the Doctor pulled the main lever to activate the TARDIS’s dematerialisation circuit, it seemed to do so almost reluctantly. “You really want to avoid this spot, don’t you?” she murmured. That was never a good sign, and although the Doctor felt bad about sometimes making the TARDIS do things that it didn’t want to do, anything that would cause that kind of aversion was usually something that couldn’t be ignored. If the TARDIS didn’t want to go somewhere, it meant that something had gone very wrong.

She had tried to aim for the center of the temporal anomaly—which was at some point between 8 PM on the eleventh of June and 4 AM on the twelfth of June—but the best she could manage was around 3:30 PM on the eleventh.

“Nice day, at least,” Yaz remarked as they left the TARDIS. 

Behind her, Ryan made a low whistle. They had landed the TARDIS near a stone wall at the edge of what turned out to be a very sizable plot of land. Ahead, in the distance, was a massive country manor. “Looks like we’re going to be snooping around in Downton Abbey,” he said.

“I suppose this is better than trying to locate a temporal anomaly on a military base,” the Doctor sighed, “but it means we’ll have to talk our way in.” She patted the pocket of her coat, confirming that she had the psychic paper with her.

Hopefully it would work properly this time. Stress often made the psychic paper a bit difficult to use, and the TARDIS’s reluctance to come here had already set the Doctor’s nerves on edge. But even without that factor, it had been a struggle ever since she returned from _that year:_ the period of time she and the Master spent as humans in Bristol, transformed by a Chameleon Arch into university students who ended up as companions of her previous regeneration, saving the world and—unexpectedly—falling in love. They had even gotten _engaged_ before they discovered the truth and reverted to their Time Lord selves.

Even worse, when they changed back, their human personas didn’t go away. Jenny Smith and Harry Jones were still lurking in the back of their minds, yearning for one another in a way that complicated what was already a very complicated relationship between her and the Master.

Ever since then, the Doctor found that she couldn’t entirely trust her instincts because it was often unclear _whose_ instincts they even were. Jenny was opinionated, persistent, and impossibly human—and had been happy in a way that the Doctor had not felt in a very long time.

She could have gone back to that: after the effects of the Arch were reversed, the Master pleaded with her to return with him, to leave behind the heartache of losing a friend and a home and a past (hundreds of years, maybe more, that she would never get back: a history erased by Tecteun and the Founders and the Division and replaced with lies), and have a normal _peaceful_ life.

She turned him down: _I can’t… I’m sorry._

And since he wouldn’t go back without her, they both stayed Time Lords—but things still changed. She and the Master kept finding ways back into each other’s thoughts and lives and—on occasion—each other’s arms. She would show up at the door of the Master’s TARDIS and they would be Jenny and Harry for a few hours, indulging in a fantasy that no one else would understand.

It was the only way she could think of to survive.

The fam had no idea: for all Yaz, Ryan, and Graham knew, she followed the Master through a portal at the Boundary, sent one of her former regenerations to take them back to the 21st century, and then turned up again a few days later in Sheffield, at which point everything had gone back to normal.

 _Put it out of your mind,_ she ordered herself as they made their way towards the manor house. They had parked the TARDIS behind the residence, which meant that they could probably find a way in through the back rather than marching up to the front door and bluffing their way inside.

Something else was in their favour: there appeared to be some kind of event going on and the back of the house was full of people unloading vehicles.

“Well, this will be _very_ straightforward,” the Doctor said cheerfully.

“Don’t say that,” Ryan groaned. “Every time you say that it goes horribly wrong.”

“All we have to do is carry a few trays inside and then we can poke around while everyone is distracted.”

“I’m with Ryan on this one,” Yaz said. “It’s _never_ that easy.”

Still, when they arrived at the back door, no one batted an eye. “See?” the Doctor whispered, passing Ryan a box of what sounded like silverware. “Meet you inside.”

She was right on their heels when a sharp female voice called, “What do you think you’re doing?”

The Doctor risked turning around to get a look at its source: a middle-aged woman with platinum-coloured hair tied back into a tight bun, wearing a dark burgundy blazer and skirt. “Just unloading this—” she tried to say before the woman interrupted her.

“Oh no, you don’t!” She took the tray out of the Doctor’s hands and passed it to someone else. “Did you really think you could sneak in the back way?” She grabbed the Doctor by the arm and pulled her towards another door, this one leading not to the kitchens but to what appeared to be a sunroom. 

“I had orders to keep an eye out for you,” the woman explained as she marched the Doctor through a blur of rather aggressively decorated Gothic Revival chambers and halls.

The eerie sensation of the temporal anomaly wasn’t present (and hadn’t been since the moment they arrived in the TARDIS), but the Doctor began to sense something else.

_Oh no._

She really shouldn’t have been surprised, but the Doctor still nearly tripped over her own feet when she saw him directing several staff members who were setting up a reception area in the entrance hall.

“I found her,” the woman at the Doctor’s side announced.

The Master’s face lit up with a grin. He passed the clipboard he was holding to one of the staff and hurried to meet her. “There you are,” he said, giving the Doctor a quick kiss. Before she could pepper him with questions, he put an arm around her shoulders and guided her into the banquet hall in the adjoining room.

“Monty,” he called to a bald man frowning at a stack of tablecloths, “have you got a moment?”

The man made his way through the chaos of dozens of round tables being set up around them. “Is this who I think it is?” he asked.

The Master’s grin grew even wider. “It is indeed. Monty Curnow, meet Jenny Smith.” His arm tightened around the Doctor's shoulders. “My wife.”

On the far side of the hall, the staff unfolded a giant banner: _Welcome, St Luke’s Alumni!_

* * *

“This kitchen is the size of my flat,” Yaz whispered to Ryan as they set down their boxes. “Bigger, actually.”

“How do people even _live_ here?” he wondered, looking around at the kitchen and the catering staff bustling around inside of it. The noise alone was enough to give him the beginnings of a headache.

“Any sign of the Doctor?” Yaz asked.

He shook his head. “Didn’t see her. Must be further inside. Come on, it’s not like they’ll miss us here.”

His assumption proved to be incorrect: they were barely at the door leading into the rest of the house when a harried-looking man in a black button-up shirt stopped them. “They’ve got more than enough staff up front,” he informed them. “We’re to stay in the kitchen and start meal prep.”

“I was looking for the lavatory,” Yaz said, doing her best to look embarrassed. 

“It’s over there.” The man pointed to a smaller hallway that was still inside the kitchen area. “When you’re done, scrub up and find Lucas in the prep kitchen.” He sighed. “I hope you’re good with knives.”

Since she couldn’t pretend that she no longer had to use it, Yaz dragged Ryan to the lavatory by the arm and shut the door behind them. 

“We could just pretend to quit,” he suggested. “It would get us out of the kitchen at least.”

Yaz looked tempted, but only for a moment. “The Doctor said that the time frame for the temporal… event? Problem?”

“Thingy?” Ryan said with a shrug.

She smiled. “Right: _thingy._ It doesn’t start until tonight. Like it or not, this our best way in. Once the event starts, they’ll need waiters, so we’ll be able to move around the house unobserved.”

“But in the meantime…”

Yaz nodded wearily. “In the meantime, we chop.”

* * *

She was going to _kill him,_ but first, the Doctor needed to keep a smile on her face. “Pleased to meet you,” she said, trying to sound cheerful in spite of the fact that the Master’s arm around her shoulders meant that she was more or less pinned in place.

“Likewise.” From first glance, Monty Curnow seemed like the sort of person who had been taught from an early age that it was better to be pleasant and agreeable than to be clever or interesting. “Harry’s told me so much about you. How are you liking Australia?”

The Doctor froze for a moment while trying to remember the cover story that the Master had put together about Jenny and Harry’s whereabouts whenever he ran into someone who had known them during _that year._ “Lovely place,” she said. “Lots of spiders and… rocks.”

“She’s being modest,” the Master said with a laugh. “Jenny’s practically revolutionising the field of molecular engineering single-handedly. Soon they’re going to run out of awards to give her.” He gave her shoulder a squeeze. “Tell him about the latest thing you’re working on.”

“It’s really boring,” the Doctor protested. “Not worth going on about.”

“Oh, come on, Monty’s a sharp cookie, I’m sure he’d be fascinated by it.”

Holding back a very rude retort, the Doctor proceeded to invent something vaguely plausible: “Well, right now we’re focused on using machine learning to create new methods for protein folding and molecular self-assembly, with the goal of increasing cytoskeletal cell signalling for biological reconstruction as opposed to tissue generation.”

Neither the Master nor Monty made any move to interrupt, so she continued to ramble; however, she also very subtly moved her foot on top of the Master’s foot and proceeded to put as much weight onto it as she possibly could.

“See?” the Master said; to the Doctor’s satisfaction, his voice sounded a little bit strained. “She’s brilliant.”

“Fascinating indeed,” Monty agreed, with the expression of someone who hadn’t understood a word of what he had just heard. “Not my area of expertise, of course. I studied finance, myself.”

“Man after my own hearts,” the Master said cheerfully; the Doctor wondered if he’d noticed the verbal slip he just made. “All those Econ courses kept me so busy, I can barely remember how many planets are in this solar system.”

“From what I’ve heard, that’s been a matter of debate,” Monty pointed out. “But you’re right: Greenley loaded me down with enough papers to clear a forest of trees.”

The Master groaned. “Oh, Greenley… now that is a name that haunts me to this day. And those early morning lectures!”

“You never went to class, _Harry,”_ the Doctor couldn’t help pointing out.

“Got me,” he said sheepishly, then sighed dramatically. “She never lets me get away with anything.”

Monty laughed. “Well, you’re not alone in missing lectures. I skived off quite a bit myself back in the day.”

“You naughty boy, you,” the Master pretended to scold him.

“Runs in the family, it seems: Kayla’s just as flighty, from what I’ve heard.”

“His daughter,” the Master explained to the Doctor.

“Class of 2024,” Monty said proudly. “Poor girl thought she was going to finally get away from here and then had to do her entire first year online due to the pandemic. Ironically, whenever she’s back home for the summer she barely leaves her room.”

“Well, hopefully she makes an appearance tonight.” The Master gestured to the stack of tablecloths. “Did Ravi put you to work setting tables?”

“I volunteered. Sitting around had me feeling a bit antsy,” Monty admitted. 

“Well, why not give us a tour of the grounds instead? Jenny’s never been to a real country house before, have you?”

“I think I need to lie down for a bit first,” the Doctor protested. “It was a long flight.”

The Master reacted like she had just told a hilarious joke. “Oh, come on, it’ll be a lovely walk. Monty’s got a greenhouse that’ll blow your mind.” He gave the man a wicked grin. “And then maybe we nip down to the cellar for a little tipple, eh?”

“You forgot the whiskey in the snooker room,” Monty reminded him.

“I _did_ forget the whiskey in the snooker room!” The Master hit his forehead with the palm of his hand. “Clearly I need the guided tour as much as Jenny does.” He looped his arm back through the Doctor’s. “Shall we?”

 _“Allons-y,”_ the Doctor muttered with another forced grin. 

* * *

“Did I mention that I’m not very good at cooking?” Ryan said, doing his best to keep the carrots he was chopping from rolling off the counter and onto the floor.

“Just be glad you didn’t get assigned the onions.” Yaz’s eyes were full-on watering at this point, and Lucas (who appeared to be one of the assistant chefs) had sent her back to chop the onions into smaller and smaller pieces twice already.

“All right!” called a loud voice from the main kitchen area. “If you’re not working on something that’s literally on fire at the moment, gather round.”

Exhaling in relief, Yaz and Ryan followed Lucas out of the prep kitchen.

The speaker was the man who had prevented them from leaving earlier in the afternoon. “We’ve posted the schedules around the kitchen,” he said, “but let’s run through it first in case anyone has any questions. The guests are arriving at 7, but some of them might be a bit early, so we’ll need to have a few trays of hors d'oeuvres ready to go, as well as the bar setup and the extra glassware.” He gave the group a stern look. “I shouldn’t have to remind you, but I recognise a few of your faces from the incident at the Corinthian last month, so let me be very clear: no one goes into the main house unless they have two things: an assignment and a uniform. No gawking, no mingling, just get in and out again as quick as you can.”

“Speaking of uniforms, Ed,” a woman with close-cropped black hair piped up. “If there’s anyone here who hasn’t checked in yet, see me right away.” She smirked. “Especially if you want a uniform that actually _fits.”_

“Thank you, Dahlia,” the man said. He checked the notes he was holding, and continued. “Right, next order of business is smoke breaks. We’ve got a chart we’ll be posting on the wall behind me, but keep in mind that emergencies do happen and we’ll need you to be a bit flexible…”

Beside her, Yaz heard Ryan sigh. “Wherever the Doctor is,” he said, “I hope she’s having a better time than we are.”

* * *

The only positive aspect of the extensive tour that the Doctor just endured was that she now had an extremely detailed knowledge of the layout of Tolland Manor, including at least one secret passageway that she tried to flee through, only to be intercepted by the Master making fun of her for “getting lost.”

Even more infuriatingly, he managed to arrange things so that they never had a moment alone, so she was forced to play along with this ridiculous charade and frantically ad lib whenever the Master came up with some anecdote about their relationship, life in Perth, and time at St Luke’s University.

“Sorry we can’t take a look at the kitchens,” Monty said apologetically. “They’re packed to the gills with caterers at the moment.”

“Maybe later tonight?” the Master suggested. He waggled his eyebrows. “Sneak in for a midnight snack, eh?”

At long last, they returned to the entrance hall. “Well,” Monty said, checking his watch, “I suppose I should head up and get ready.” He grinned. “Wouldn’t do to be late to my own party.”

“Or worse, incur Ravi’s wrath,” the Master said with a laugh.

She was starting to get very tired of that laugh, especially since it wasn’t even his _real_ laugh (fortunately, it wasn’t the maniacal cackling either), and the Doctor felt her hearts starting to ache the longer it went on, which was confusing until she realised the reason:

She missed Harry Jones. She missed _his_ laugh and _his_ stupid jokes, and instead had to deal with this smarmy bastard who kept flattering Monty like he was his personal hero. Just the Master in disguise as usual, only this time she already knew it was him.

At least she no longer had to wonder who was responsible for the temporal anomaly that had brought them here.

“We need to talk,” she hissed in his ear the moment she could be sure that they wouldn’t be overheard.

“Patience, love, you can have me all to yourself soon enough,” he teased, then waved at someone across the hall. “Janice! How’s the setup going?”

The target of his question was a young woman who was about thirty percent curves and thirty percent curly red hair. “Harry, there you are,” she said with a bright smile on her face. “We’re right on schedule.” She frowned slightly. “Though Richard was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago.”

“Oh, you know Ricky,” the Master said, pretending to groan. “Always has his own interpretation of what time it is.”

“Well, he’s the only one on the committee we’re still waiting on. How’s Monty doing?”

“He’s gone to get ready. His speech is done, but I think you might want to give it another look before things get underway. I told him he was allowed no more than two anecdotes and at least one of them had to be clean. Now, before we head upstairs to get ready as well,” he pulled the Doctor a little closer, “I don’t know if you remember Jenny?”

“Who could forget Jenny Smith?” Janice laughed. “The two of you were the most well-known students in our year.”

“It’s all right, you can say ‘obnoxious,’” the Master joked. The Doctor did her best to smile politely.

Janice gave her hand a brief squeeze. “Lovely to see you again, dear. You know, Harry’s been quite the _personality_ on the reunion committee. I’m not sure how this would have turned out without his input.”

“I was the one who got Monty to agree to host,” the Master explained. “Reignited some of that old school spirit.”

“Which kept us from having to hold the reunion at the dining hall on campus. Now, I don’t know if you know,” she leaned in conspiratorially, “but Harry here would _not stop talking_ about you!”

“Yeah, he never seems to _shut up,_ does he?” the Doctor said through gritted teeth.

The Master pretended to take offense. “Well, talk about the pot calling the kettle black!”

Janice laughed again and shook her head. “You two… still the same as you were back at St Luke’s, aren’t you? Arguing from dawn until dusk.”

“Well, we’ve learned how to kiss and make up at the end of it,” the Master said with a smirk. “Especially _after_ dusk—”

“Let’s go, _dear,”_ the Doctor interrupted, pulling him by the arm towards the staircase.

“She just flew in from Perth,” he told Janice over his shoulder. “You can understand why she’d want some alone time—”

“Just make it back before 6:45, all right?” Janice called after them.

“We’ll see if she lets me!”

“Stop talking before I push you down the stairs,” the Doctor whispered with a glare.

* * *

Lucas grimaced at the results of their work. “Well, I’ve seen worse,” he said. “Go take a break while I deal with these.” His expression implied that he was going to have to do a bit more chopping on his own before the vegetables were actually ready to cook.

Relieved, Yaz and Ryan ran for the back door.

“Fresh air,” she gasped. “Never thought I’d be so thankful for that.”

Ryan, meanwhile, was examining his fingers. “I’m just relieved I didn’t bleed on any of the potatoes.” He had cut himself at least half a dozen times that he noticed, and probably had at least another nick or two that he wouldn’t find until he touched something acidic.

“I’m not sure I’m going to make it to the _beginning_ of the event, let alone the end of it.”

Yaz wasn’t the only one who was exhausted; Ryan could feel a headache coming on from all the noise. “Cheer up, we might get some tips out of this,” he joked. 

She smiled but it didn’t seem to lift her spirits much. “I still don’t understand why the Doctor hasn’t come looking for us,” she admitted.

“Well, if she was in danger, we’d know… probably because something would be on fire.”

“You’ve got a point there.” Yaz sighed. “You know, she’s been acting weird, even before all this started.”

“The texting thing?”

She nodded. “Yeah. Were you there the time I picked up her phone after she’d dropped it and she nearly bit my hand off?”

“No, but I caught the sulking that she did afterwards,” Ryan said. He noticed Yaz’s pensive expression. “What’s the matter?”

“It’s…” She laughed. “Never mind, it’s absurd.”

 _“She’s_ absurd. What is it?”

“It’s just… the last time she was texting someone so much, it was—”

The back door banged open and Yaz’s speculation was interrupted by the arrival of two women: one with platinum-blonde hair in a bun and the other with curly red hair. They both looked like they’d swallowed a lemon.

“—and if he makes one more joke about Monty’s golf game, I swear I’ll strangle him with one of those awful neckties,” the redhead complained. “Ugh, I need a smoke. Do you mind?”

“As long as you pass me one,” the blonde said.

“You’re lucky, you know,” the redhead said as she took a pack of cigarettes from her purse, “you didn’t have to deal with him at school.”

“He’s obnoxious enough at committee meetings,” the blonde pointed out, lighting her cigarette.

“Oh, this is Jones when he’s well-behaved, trust me. People would _run_ when they saw him coming their way on campus. And he honestly believes that tossing a few thousand quid in the alumni fund will make everyone forget how miserable he made them back then?”

“He did get Monty, though—”

“And you know we’re never going to hear the end of _that._ He only managed it because Monty’s a soft touch with no friends. Jones saw him coming a mile away and is going to take that man for all he’s worth, just you wait.”

“Ricky said something about them doing a business venture together,” the blonde said. 

“Some kind of investment advisory bullshit,” the redhead confirmed. “Jones is probably making a mint off of it, the slimy bastard.” She made a face. “And that _wife_ of his. An absolute cow, almost as unpleasant as Jones is.”

“Sounds like they’re a perfect match.”

“That’s the only consolation I can think of: they’re stuck with one another now, probably making each other’s lives a living hell.”

The blonde made a snort of laughter. “Is it true that Jones drove that old Scottish lecturer into retirement?”

“The two of them together,” the redhead replied bitterly. “They say he’d been there for over fifty years—though I don’t think he was _that_ old—but all it took was one year with Smith and Jones for him to throw in the towel. Vanished without a trace in the middle of the night.”

“Too bad. I liked him—well, liked his lectures. He was a bit rude, personally.”

“I actually dropped his class because of them, you know. They kept arguing in lectures and no one could learn a bloody thing. I had to make it up the next term and practically had a nervous breakdown from the extra coursework.”

The blonde was apparently trying and failing to look sympathetic. “What was that lecturer’s name again? Doctor—”

“Is that you out there, Madeline?” a man yelled from inside the house. 

“Yes,” the blonde called back impatiently.

“We can’t find the plastic container with the banner for the podium.”

Madeline growled in annoyance and stomped her cigarette out under the heel of her shoe. “Ravi couldn’t find his own ass with two hands,” she muttered. “Come on, I’m not doing this on my own.”

The redhead put out her own cigarette and followed her into the house.

Yaz and Ryan exchanged a look. “On the bright side,” she said, “it sounds like everyone’s going to be distracted once the event gets underway.”

“Let’s hope so,” he agreed, then winced at the sound of Lucas shouting from inside the kitchen.

* * *

“What is the _matter_ with you?” the Doctor demanded once she and the Master were alone in one of the upstairs bedrooms.

“Other than the obvious?” he replied with a smirk.

“The TARDIS detected a massive surge of temporal energy originating from this location in space and time, where you just _coincidentally_ happened to be organising a school reunion?” She glared at him. “Tell me what you’re planning.”

“What would be the fun in that?”

“An energy surge of that magnitude could tear this entire region apart. I’m not letting you put everyone in danger.”

The amusement on his face didn’t fade. “Well, good news for you, then, because no one here is in danger tonight.”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Why should I believe you?”

Now he looked annoyed. “Because, as we’ve established in the past, I’d like to retire here and I can’t do that if the Earth gets blown to bits. And, as we have _also_ made rather clear, I’d like to spend that retirement _with_ you, which means that I have a vested interest in staying on your good side. So you can relax.”

“What’s the source of the anomaly?” she demanded.

“Now _that_ would be spoiling the surprise.” He sat down on the bed. “But, if you’re very good tonight, I’ll give you some clues. One clue per hour.” He patted the spot on the bed next to him. “And in exchange, we spend the evening together as Jenny and Harry.”

The Doctor rolled her eyes. “The person who dragged me around for over an hour, acting like he had stumbled out of a Wodehouse novel, was _not_ Harry Jones.”

“Oh, that was just me putting Monty at ease. I had to schmooze with quite a few old-school Tories back when I was running for Prime Minister.” He grinned. “Still know the lingo.”

“Which I assume was so you could find a way into his house without raising suspicion?”

“That, and so much more. But,” he raised a finger to his lips, “spoilers.”

“So you want me to play dress-up with you tonight?”

He stood up. “I prefer to think of it as _roleplay,”_ the Master said teasingly as he moved closer to her. “Sounds much sexier that way.”

She probably should have backed away, the Doctor realised as their lips met.

_Damn it._

Her instincts were very much not her own at the moment, but his probably weren’t either, which meant that it would have been more accurate to say that it was Jenny who shoved Harry down onto the bed and climbed on top of him.

Or at least that was how the Doctor preferred to think about it.


	2. If You Want Another Kind of Love

_Damn it._

There had to be a way for her and the Master to be around one another, the Doctor thought, without giving in to their human counterparts’ longing and, well, _lust._

Especially because it was a bit awkward having to pick her clothes up from the floor all the time.

“Wait,” the Master said when the Doctor was about halfway dressed. “I have a surprise for you.”

“What, other than the onslaught of surprises you unleashed on me all afternoon?” she remarked drily.

“Tonight’s event is black-tie formal.” He went to the closet, which contained two garment bags and several other shirts and trousers on hangers. “I did a little shopping for you.”

“How long have you been here?” the Doctor asked with a frown.

“Since yesterday morning. Though I visit often enough that I’ve started leaving some clothes here.” He took out both garment bags and handed one of them to the Doctor.

She didn’t open it. “Rather cozy with Monty, aren’t you?”

The Master flashed her a smile. “Jealous?”

She rolled her eyes. “More like concerned for his safety.”

“Don’t worry, love, you’ll always be the one I want most.” He pointed at the bag in her hands. “Aren’t you going to open it?”

Sighing, the Doctor unzipped the bag. She had been hoping for a tuxedo, like the nice one she had worn to Daniel Barton’s party (and then unexpectedly to the Kasaavin’s dimension, the 19th century, and the 20th century), but instead she found herself holding a short dark blue jacket with a subtle shimmer, matching narrow-leg trousers, and a cream-coloured silk blouse.

“Boots are over there under the mirror,” he said, taking a tuxedo out of his garment bag.

“I’d rather wear one of those,” she commented, indicating his outfit.

“You ruined the last tux you wore,” the Master scolded her as he dressed. “I’m not letting you dirty up another one.”

“I got it _dirty_ because you chucked me into another dimension without a TARDIS!”

He pretended to look offended. “That’s no reason to not care for your own appearance. And, since you have no taste whatsoever, I’ll have to provide it _for_ you.” He finally seemed to notice that she was glaring at him. “Cheer up, I could have put you in a dress and stilettos.”

“I wouldn’t have worn it.”

“I know, which is why I got you this instead.” He grinned and headed to the ensuite bath to shave. “Compromise is key to a healthy marriage.”

For a moment, the Doctor considered abandoning the whole idea and going back to the TARDIS until this bizarre charade of an event was over and she could do her usual sneaking around thing.

Except…

_Come on, what’s the harm in enjoying yourself for a few hours?_

Besides, she reasoned, at least this way she could keep track of the Master’s whereabouts and prevent him from manipulating anyone else, not to mention keep him away from Yaz and Ryan—wherever they were.

 _Not to mention keep Yaz and Ryan from seeing_ _him_ _._

She wasn’t sure which outcome she was more worried about.

Still a bit reluctant, she got dressed. “I’m almost impressed,” she said, pulling on the jacket. “These actually fit.” Although, she noticed with a private grimace, they were a closer fit than she preferred, especially the trousers.

“Well, I’ve had plenty of opportunities to get familiar with your dimensions.” He gave her a wink and wiped the stray bits of shaving cream off of his face.

Looking at him, the Doctor felt a twinge in her hearts. The way he was dressed now, clean-shaven and hair properly combed, made him look so much like O, back before she knew who the MI6 agent really was.

It was a depressing realisation, but every time the Master pretended to be someone else, she found herself inevitably attracted to them in some way: Professor Yana’s brilliant mind, Missy’s charming eccentricity, O’s curiosity and enthusiasm… the list went on and on, all the way to the present day, with Harry Jones’ reckless compassion and love.

“Do you still have your ring?” the Master asked, sitting on the bed to put on his socks and shoes.

“Yes.” She dug through the pockets of her usual coat and pulled out the item that she couldn’t seem to get rid of. When she slipped it onto her left hand, she could faintly feel the impression of the words that had been etched inside the tungsten band: _World Enough and Time._

Bitterly ironic, then, that Harry and Jenny hadn’t had enough of either.

 _Put it out of your mind,_ she ordered herself for what felt like the thousandth time that day. _If you keep this up, you’ll drown in your own tears._

By the time she finished putting on her boots, which had enough of a wedge heel to make her long for her usual boots, she noticed that the Master was leaning against the wall by the mirror, watching her with a satisfied expression on his face, and holding a canister of something in his hand.

“What’s that—” But the Doctor’s question was answered before she could even ask it: the Master lunged at her and rubbed something into her hair. “Oi, hands off!” she sputtered.

“It’s just mousse,” he said, continuing to fuss with her hair. 

“If you come at me with makeup, I’m going to bite you,” she cautioned him.

“No need to worry about that,” he reassured her. “Ever since I regenerated I can’t do a decent winged eyeliner to save my life.”

“Not that you need it,” the Doctor remarked before realising that she had just paid him a compliment.

He gave her a sly grin. “Yeah, the eyelashes are quite good in this one, aren’t they?”

She finally swatted his hands away. “Let’s get this over with,” she said impatiently.

Before she left the bedroom, however, she took a peek in the full-length mirror on the wall. The person who stared back at her was just different enough in appearance that she briefly flashed back to what she told the fam about the Uncanny Valley.

“What do you think?” the Master asked from over her shoulder.

“It’s… girly,” she muttered. 

He snorted quietly. “In the context of this location and time period, it qualifies as barely femme-of-center.” He leaned in and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “You look gorgeous.”

“Ugh. This had better be a _very_ fiendish scheme I’m thwarting.”

He pouted. “What, no compliments on _my_ appearance?”

“I’m not here to prop up your vanity,” the Doctor retorted. “You said that I’d get a clue every hour—I assume that the hour doesn’t start until we’re downstairs?”

“Got me,” he confessed cheerfully. “Shall we, Jenny?”

She took his hand with a sigh.

* * *

“Well, it’s not tuxedos,” Yaz said, adjusting the collar of her shirt and making sure that her TARDIS key was securely hidden underneath, “but it’s not bad.”

“Speak for yourself,” Ryan grumbled, examining his slightly-too-tight shirt with a worried expression. “I’m going to be spending the whole time in danger of popping a button on this thing.”

“Try not to sneeze or anything,” she joked. “You’ll put someone’s eye out.”

He glared at her and fidgeted with the collar.

“It’s the only one that’s going to even remotely fit you,” Yaz had overheard Dahlia sigh when she handed it to him. “Everything else we have is about five sizes too big for you.”

Even more frustrating, they wouldn’t be sent out of the kitchen for at least another hour, and things were so tightly regimented that they couldn’t even nip out without being spotted and reprimanded. 

“How were we able to sneak in here to begin with?” Yaz wondered. 

“I think they had one or two no-shows,” Ryan said, helping her put empty champagne flutes onto trays, “and at that point, they probably weren’t about to ask many questions.”

“And meanwhile,” Yaz said, lowering her voice, “Ed’s been over there watching us like a hawk.”

“Do you think he suspects?” The man in charge of the catering had spent most of the afternoon running from place to place; it must have gotten quieter, because now he kept hovering around.

She shook her head. “No, I think he’s more worried about us stealing the silver or something.”

There was a brief commotion further back in the kitchen, which sent Ed over to check on it.

Yaz saw Ryan grimace at the sound. “You okay?” she asked.

“Just a headache,” he said, rubbing his temples. “Looks like our surveillance is gone. Want to try sneaking out?”

“We can each take one of these out to the front,” Yaz said, indicating the tray of flutes. However, she grabbed it a little too quickly, which caused the glasses to wobble violently. 

He reached out to steady them, but only succeeded in tipping two of them over, which shattered on the floor. 

“This might make the plan a little difficult,” Yaz realised.

Ryan sighed. “There’s a reason why I never wanted to be a waiter. And not even because of the dyspraxia.”

“But I imagine it doesn’t help.”

To her surprise, he grinned. “It was a great excuse for not having to do the washing up when I was a kid, though.” He looked down at the broken glass. “I’ll go get a broom.”

A few seconds after he left, Yaz caught a glimpse of colour out of the corner of her eye. She turned and saw a young woman in a short black dress, with vibrant purple hair tied back in a loose braid, slip out of the kitchen and into the main house carrying a bottle of champagne in an ice bucket.

She obviously noticed Yaz watching her because she smiled, put a finger to her lips in a _shh_ gesture, and cocked her head slightly to imply that Yaz should follow her.

But before Yaz could make up her mind to do so, Ryan returned with a broom and a very upset Ed.

* * *

“Did you know,” Harry said on their way down the staircase, “that at some of the older universities, they would call these types of gatherings ‘gaudies’?”

Jenny gave a snort of laughter. “‘Gaudy’ is certainly the right word for it. I’m not surprised you had a hand in this.” The sheer number of banners, tablecloths, and _surfaces_ in general bearing the seal of St Luke’s University was an assault on the eyes, in her opinion. 

“Excuse me, but I thought I was being rather _restrained,”_ he retorted.

“Imagine if we’d had a huge blowout of a wedding,” Jenny groaned. “You’d have been the worst bridezilla.”

“Well, considering that we could barely scrape together enough people to act as witnesses for our _actual_ wedding, I don’t think we were really in danger of that.”

“I suppose it’s because we’re too obsessed with each other to make friends with anyone else,” she joked. “Now come on, I want to see if there are any tiny cheeses or something to eat.”

The new shoes took a little getting used to, unfortunately. “I don’t see why I couldn’t have worn my usual boots,” she complained after nearly tripping and only being saved from falling on her face by Harry’s arm looped through hers.

“It’s just for one night,” Harry reassured her.

“I might need you to keep me upright,” Jenny said with a grimace. 

“I’ll tell them all that you can’t hold your liquor, how about that?” he teased.

Her sharp reply was stopped by the sight of a tray of hors d’oeuvres passing within range. “Ooo, little mozzarella things!”

By the time she had acquired a handful of appetizers (and, after a _very_ strong suggestion from the waiter, a plate to put them on), Harry had been drawn into conversation with someone else.

For a moment, Jenny just stood back and watched him talk—schmooze, more accurately. Despite finding him _extremely_ disagreeable and obnoxious when they first met, she couldn’t deny that there was something magnetic about Harry, even charming when he put in the effort.

Even when she wanted to strangle him, she couldn’t _not_ pay attention to him.

_(“Why would it ever stop? I mean, how else would I get your attention?”)_

Not Harry’s voice, she reminded herself desperately. Not Jenny’s memory.

Before she could slip into a full-blown existential crisis, however, Harry turned and smiled at her, and Jenny felt like herself again.

* * *

“How many people are out there?” Yaz wondered out loud. She was pretty sure that she’d loaded more water glasses onto trays than she had ever seen in her entire life up until that point. 

“I think they’re expecting about 150,” one of the other staff members said as they took the tray from her. “It’s mobbed out there—I hadn’t even _heard_ of this uni until tonight.”

“What’s it called?” In all the commotion, she hadn’t caught the name.

“St Luke’s. Some school in Bristol, apparently.”

Yaz blinked in surprise. She _had_ heard of St Luke’s University.

Back during the incident at the Boundary after the Doctor vanished with the Master and sent one of her previous regenerations to take them back to the 21st century, there had been someone with them in the TARDIS: a woman in Edwardian-era clothes who stared at Yaz and Ryan with a smile that was eerily familiar. 

When they asked her who she was, she replied airily: _“Oh, no one special. Just the Doctor’s little houseguest at St Luke’s University, if you ever felt like popping round for a visit—”_

Then the Doctor—the other one, the annoyed-looking Scotsman—shushed her, and the woman was silent for the rest of the trip back to Sheffield.

So the Doctor had apparently spent a period of time at the university that was having an alumni reunion in the same place that the TARDIS had detected an unexpected burst of temporal energy.

This didn’t feel like a coincidence.

“Go take your break now,” Dahlia told her. “They’ll be going in for dinner soon, at which point we’ll need all hands on deck. There’s snacks on the table outside next to the van. Remember to hydrate, and stay within earshot, all right?”

With a sigh, Yaz headed out through the kitchen back door. On her way out, she looked around for any sign of Ryan, but he wasn’t around. All she could do was hope that he had found his own way out and into the rest of the house. 

Though it would have been nice if he’d texted her… but the Doctor hadn't responded to any of Yaz’s texts either.

She had just grabbed a bottle of water and a packet of crisps when she heard a voice from the shadows. “There you are, I’ve been waiting ages!”

Instead of the Doctor, Yaz turned to find the purple-haired girl from earlier. “You were waiting for me?” she asked, puzzled.

The girl grinned and held up the bottle of champagne she had taken from the kitchen. “You and that lovely fellow caused a fantastic distraction, which let me sneak out without being spotted. I figured it was only fair to share my ill-gotten gains. Where is he, by the way?”

Now Yaz understood the real reason for the girl’s interest: this wasn’t the first time since they’d started travelling with the Doctor that Yaz was invited somewhere in the hopes that Ryan would come along as well.

So she’d have to disappoint Ryan’s latest admirer: “I haven’t seen him. He’s probably passing out appetizers.”

Instead of retracting the invitation, though, the girl looked relieved. “Well, that makes things easier. I don’t think I’d have been able to find clothes for him. You, on the other hand, are about my size.”

“Sorry, what?”

“The party’s formal dress. Dad forbade me from hiding in my room the whole night, and I don’t want to deal with a bunch of old Lukeys on my own. I need moral support and I’m more than willing to bribe someone to do it.”

The implication finally hit her. “Wait… you _live_ here?”

“Sorry, should have led with that,” the girl said sheepishly. “Kayla Curnow. My dad’s the one throwing this shindig. What’s your name?”

“Yasmin—you can call me Yaz, though.”

“I absolutely will. So, Yaz: want to be my date to the party?”

Although Yaz felt a little bad at the possibility of abandoning Ryan to an evening of drudgery, it made sense for them to split up so they could cover more ground. This way, she reasoned, she’d get access to parts of the house that the others might not have.

And besides, she had been on her feet for hours and was exhausted.

_Sorry, Ryan._

“Sure,” she said.

Kayla’s grin widened. “Brilliant. Let’s go pregame and put on makeup.” 

“You know,” Yaz pointed out as they headed towards a door leading into a sunroom, “you probably could have asked them for a bottle and they’d have just given it to you.”

“Yeah, but where’s the fun in that?” Kayla scoffed.

Despite the rather massive differences in looks and circumstances, there was something about Kayla that reminded Yaz a little bit of the Doctor.

Which meant that, even though Yaz would never admit to it out loud, she was secretly glad that it was just the two of them.

* * *

“I think the waiters are avoiding me,” Jenny said, scanning the room for an opportunity to snag a few more appetizers. 

“Not avoiding,” Harry corrected her. “It’s almost time for dinner.”

She snorted. “What, worried I’ll spoil my appetite?”

But Harry’s answer was interrupted by Monty: “Well, look at the two of you,” he said.

“We clean up nicely, don’t we?” Harry replied with a grin. Jenny, meanwhile, resisted the urge to touch her hair and comb the mousse out of it with her fingers.

A mixture of memory and imagination filled her mind: memories of their trip with the Doctor to the Frost Fair in 1814 and the way that Harry had fussed over her attire and did his best to pin up her hair. She imagined what it would be like to have this all the time: to have Harry take care of her in his own annoying way, wrapping her in scarves when it was chilly out and making sure that she hadn’t forgotten to eat that day because she had gotten so engrossed in a problem. She thought about all the ways she took care of him: reminding him to go to bed when he was distracted by something, insulting him until he cleaned up after himself, and forcing him to stay home when he was sick.

Another memory—

_“So,” Missy said, surveying the open space of the Vault, “this is my home for the next thousand years, then?”_

_“I can obviously bring you things,” the Doctor said, feeling awkward. “Furniture and such.”_

_“A piano,” she said immediately, then added, “A_ _good_ _one.”_

_“I’ll get you a piano,” he agreed. It would give Nardole something to do other than bothering him all the time._

_It was strange, having her here, he reflected. He kept waiting for Missy to spring a trap, or try to escape, or sabotage his TARDIS on the way over… but she seemed content to just sit there—or, in this case, stand there, since there weren’t any chairs in the Vault. He’d send Nardole to get one._

_Maybe two, he thought. That way, when he came to visit they would—_

_They would actually get to_ _talk_ _, he realised. For the first time in what felt like forever, he and Missy could just… sit and talk. They might even be able to have a conversation without trying to ruin one another’s day at the same time._

_“If you need anything else,” he said, “I won’t be far, you can just knock on the door—”_

_She emitted a short laugh of disbelief. “You’re really doing this.”_

_“Doing what?”_

_“Staying here. Guarding me. You’re not just going to jump in the TARDIS and go off somewhere?”_

_“I swore an oath,” he pointed out._

_“And you’re actually going to see it through? Stay in one spot for a thousand years? Give up travelling, all so you can guard my wicked body?” She made another snort of laughter. “All so you can take care of me?”_

_His discomfort grew. He had agreed to it: agreed to save the life of the person who had once been his friend and who insisted that they were_ _still_ _friends, because, in spite of everything she had done, he believed that anyone could change, even her._

_And if she did change, what would happen next?_

_“Do you want chips?” he said abruptly. “There’s probably a place nearby, I could send Nardole…”_

_For a moment, she stared at him with an expression he couldn’t decipher. Then, almost shyly, she replied: “I suppose that would be all right.”_

“You haven’t seen Kayla, have you?” Monty asked, jarring Jenny out of the Doctor’s memories.

“Not in here,” Harry said. “The purple hair’s a bit of a giveaway, so I’m sure I would have spotted her.”

“Hmph,” he grunted. “Still barricaded in her room, I expect.”

“Have you got your speech with you?”

Monty patted his pocket. “Right here.”

“Have you reviewed it with Janice yet?”

He sighed. “Not yet.”

“Not to worry,” Harry reassured him. “You’re seated at the same table.”

“Do you happen to know if she brought someone with her?” he asked, looking hopeful.

Harry gave him a knowing grin. “You naughty boy,” he scolded Monty.

“I was merely curious,” he huffed, then caught sight of someone across the room. “Oh, there’s Richard. I should say hello, shouldn’t I?”

“Go on,” Harry said, taking Jenny’s hand. “We’re going to get some fresh air before dinner starts.”

“How long have you known Monty?” she asked as they walked towards the front door.

“About two years,” Harry said. “I discovered he was an alumnus of St Luke’s and introduced myself. He was in need of some investment advice, so I offered my expertise. We shared a few interests in common—well, I may have exaggerated my interest in golf a bit—and I sometimes come down to stay the weekend.”

They strolled together on the front lawn. At this point in the summer, the sun was still up, so Jenny could see how vast an estate they were really on. From the look of it, Tolland Manor was completely isolated from everything around it; the nearest residences were probably kilometers away. “Was this introduction before or after you got involved with Janice and that committee?” she asked.

He grinned. “Well, that’s a tricky question. I joined the alumni committee about four months before introducing myself to Monty… but I only got that sudden rush of school spirit after meeting him.”

“So you’re using him for something,” the Doctor said, pulling her hand away. “As usual.”

The Master checked his watch. “It’s still a few minutes early for your first clue, Doctor, but I’ll bend the rules just this once: old Monty is getting a delivery of something tonight, after the party is over.”

“And you’re here to steal it.” An alien artifact, she assumed: something that he could use to threaten, maim, or otherwise destroy either the Earth or her.

“You’re not going to tip Monty off, are you?” He didn’t seem worried, which made the Doctor even more annoyed. “Because if you do, I’m afraid that we might end up having a little marital spat, which means that you’d have to leave the party early.” He smirked. “And then you’ll miss the surprise.”

“Why are you doing this?” she demanded.

“Not telling you,” he replied cheerfully. “Not yet, at any rate. You’ll have to wait and see.”

The Doctor scowled at him. “Whatever you’ve got planned,” she said, “you don’t have to do it. You could just stop and leave.”

“Too late, love: it’s already begun.” He laughed at her. “Go on, crack a smile. I’ve made this one easy for you: you’ll be at my side the whole night, watching every move I make. You can even come with me when Monty’s delivery arrives.”

They walked together in silence for a few minutes while the Doctor tried to come up with a solution that would let her foil his plan immediately.

But all she could come up with was, in his words, “wait and see.”

“Tell me the truth,” she said. “Is the Earth in danger?”

The Master stopped walking and took both of her hands in his. “I promise: whatever is happening tonight, nothing will happen to the people in this house, or the people in Somerset, or Britain, _or_ the Northern Hemisphere, _or_ Earth, _or_ this entire damned galaxy. Everyone and every _thing_ will be _fine._ All right?”

There were so many times when she thought he was telling the truth… and every time, she was wrong.

He noticed her hesitation. “You don’t believe me.”

“You destroyed _our_ planet.”

“And you’ll always hold that against me, I assume?” he said bitterly. To her surprise, he didn’t let go of her hands.

“Why wouldn’t I?” She was more tired than angry. “You had a tantrum and millions of people died.”

The Master snorted in derision. “I’m sure you miss them all terribly.”

She glared at him for a moment before an awful possibility occurred to her. “I wonder, though,” the Doctor said slowly, “if you also did it so that it would be just the two of us again, like it was after the War.” She could feel her stomach churning as she remembered. “I let you get away with so many things back then, just so I wouldn’t be alone.”

He stared at her with an expression she couldn’t decipher. She wondered if she’d struck a nerve.

“That’s interesting,” he said at last. “That’s really interesting.” His grip on her fingers tightened as he leaned in closer. “Do you want to know what I think?” he whispered.

“What?”

He released her hands. “I think it’s time for dinner. You’ll get more answers in an hour.”

Exhaling in frustration, the Doctor followed him back inside.

* * *

“Hmm…” Kayla said, tossing another dress onto the bed. “I’d say go with the red, except that you’re going to be by my side the whole time so it’s best if we didn’t clash.” She indicated her purple hair. “Can’t exactly change the colour for the evening—although, I do have a few wigs somewhere…”

“It’s all right,” Yaz assured her. “I wasn’t that big of a fan of the dress anyway. I’d rather stick with black.”

She really hoped that it would narrow things down a little—Kayla’s wardrobe was almost as extensive as the one in the TARDIS—but instead Kayla pushed a rack of clothes aside to reveal _another_ rack, this one full of black dresses. “Let’s get started, then!”

They’d been at this for almost an hour, Yaz realised, and while she was more or less enjoying herself, she couldn’t help feeling a little guilty for leaving Ryan behind. She tried reassuring herself again that this was just another way for her to help the Doctor figure out what was going on.

And besides, it was nice to be fussed over. 

“How about this one?” Kayla asked, holding up a long black dress with a bodice covered in tiny sequins.

“Might be a bit much,” Yaz said. Although she didn’t mind the design, she also knew that she would probably need to sneak around the house at some point, and the sequins might catch the light and give her away.

“You’re right,” Kayla agreed, tossing it in the direction of the bed and missing. “It’s a nightmare to accessorise.”

While her hostess continued rummaging through her closet, Yaz took the opportunity to gather information. “Your dad went to St Luke’s, then?”

“Yup, a proud Lukey if there ever was one. Though that bit’s relatively new.”

“What do you mean?” Anything that was a recent change might be a clue to what was going on here.

Kayla held up a pair of what looked like identical black dresses, frowned at them, and then dropped them on the floor. “His old investment adviser retired so he went looking for a new one. The guy he hired was a St Luke’s alum and he roped Dad into getting involved with the old alma mater. Which is how I ended up there too. Not that I mind,” she added, “since I’ve inherited Dad’s academic mediocrity and would be utterly hopeless at one of the more impressive schools. I’m really just getting the diploma out of the way so I can say that I’ve done it, you know?”

“Yeah, I get it.” In truth, Yaz didn’t _entirely_ understand it, since she’d started the IPLDP straight out of secondary school, but she had a few friends who had gone to university. The idea of just picking up a diploma the way one would pick up something from the shop was… weird.

On the other hand, Yaz reflected as she looked around the enormous room, this entire _evening_ was weird.

“So this adviser,” she prompted, “is he here tonight?”

For some reason, Kayla grinned. “This whole shebang was his idea. He’s the one who convinced Dad to host and is basically guiding him through the evening like Dad’s a meek little lamb.”

Yaz frowned. “You aren’t worried he’s taking advantage of your father?”

“Oh, he definitely is,” Kayla laughed, “but Dad doesn’t mind; I think he rather likes being taken advantage of. He’s not clever or interesting—and he knows it—so he uses the fact that he’s loaded to get some company once in a while—oh, not like that,” she reassured Yaz. “He’s too shy to consider callgirls, though it really would simplify things. It’s more that he’s desperately hoping to find a nice golddigger to settle down with. That’s what my mother was—only she got bored with him eventually and moved back to wherever it was in Sweden that she came from.” She shrugged. “So it’s just Dad and me, which is why I’m relieved he’s made friends with Harry.”

“Harry’s the adviser?” 

“That’s him: Harry Jones, Dad’s BFF. Frankly, I had hoped that _he_ might be the golddigger Dad was looking for—he’s _gorgeous,_ though a little short for my taste—but alas, he’s married. And before you ask,” she said, leaving the closet and heading for the bottle of champagne, “Harry’s _obsessed_ with his wife. In _his_ opinion, Jenny Smith is the smartest, funniest, and most attractive person to _ever_ walk the earth. Like, he _cannot stop_ bringing her up. It would be annoying if he wasn’t cute enough to get away with it.” She popped the cork with a tiny squeal of excitement. “I’ve never met her, but she’s supposedly here tonight. I assume I’ll be disappointed.” She poured some of the champagne into a plastic cup. “Drink?” she offered.

“No thanks,” Yaz said.

“You sure?”

“Muslim,” she explained.

“Got it,” Kayla said. “There’s a little refrigerator by the desk over there. It’s still got a few cans of… something. San Pell, I think. Help yourself.” She took a sip of the champagne and grimaced. “Ugh, tastes like tin. I assumed they’d have better stuff than this.”

Yaz grinned as she headed to the fridge. “I’m glad I passed on it, then.”

“Grab two cans while you’re at it. I need to mix this with something. Right,” she said, taking another sip of the champagne and heading back to the closet, “I’m thinking… skater dress. Something that swishes when you walk in it. What do you think?”

“Nothing too noisy,” Yaz cautioned. She handed Kayla a can of sparkling water.

“Ooo, you’re right,” she said. “We wouldn’t be able to sneak around the house otherwise.”

This seemed almost too good to be true. “Sneak around?”

“What, you thought I’d drag you up here without offering you a backstage tour?” For a moment, Kayla looked oddly unsure of herself. “I mean, if you want to.”

“Of course I do,” Yaz hurried to say. Not just because this would help the Doctor solve the latest mystery, but because Kayla seemed almost desperately lonely. “I’m up for anything.”

Kayla beamed in relief. “Brilliant.” She went back to rummaging through her closet, finally emerging with a knee-length dress with a keyhole neckline. “What do you think?” she asked, bringing it over and holding it up to check how it looked on Yaz.

She would have to figure out a way to hide the TARDIS key, but she was pretty sure that the cord was long enough for it to stay out of sight. “Looks fine,” she said.

“Looks _fantastic,”_ Kayla corrected her. “And the best part?” She leaned in as though confiding a secret. “It has pockets.”

Yaz snickered. “The words every girl wants to hear.”

“Exactly!” 

Their eyes met and, in that brief moment, Yaz noticed that, although closer to green than amber, Kayla’s hazel eyes were a little like the Doctor’s.

_Oh._

Her friend Aisha used to say, back when one or both of them would gush over their latest crushes, “If you know the colour of their eyes, then it’s already too late.”

_Oh dear._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Every time I introduce a new OC it always feels like I'm introducing a new significant other to my family: "yes, hello, please like her or at least tolerate her for this one evening."
> 
> I also spent possibly too much time on Google Image Search looking for reference photos of Jodie Whittaker and Mandip Gill in fancy outfits (just kidding, there is no such thing as spending too much time on that).


	3. If You Want a Partner

“I’m… well, I’m not going to say I’m _confused—”_

“Oh, go on, say it,” Harry prodded her cheerfully. “I don’t get to see you confused all that often.”

Jenny looked annoyed. “I’m not _confused,_ just lacking vital _information—”_

“Your nose does this very cute scronching thing when you’re confused.”

“—so it’s _research,_ really—”

“You’re doing the scronch thing right now, in fact.”

“Stop it,” Jenny said, resisting the urge to give Harry’s face (which had been gradually moving into kissing range over the last few seconds) a good shove. “I’m _curious:_ why aren’t we seated at Monty’s table?”

“I’m utterly _aghast,_ Smith—”

 _“Doctor_ Smith, if you please,” she interrupted primly.

He rubbed his chin and pretended to ponder something. “I think _‘Mrs Jones’_ has a lovely ring to it, don’t you—”

“I will drive this salad fork into your face, _darling,_ unless you get to the point.”

“I’m just surprised that you hadn’t figured it out for yourself already.”

“I’ve been here less than six hours,” she protested. “Forgive me if I’m still catching up.”

“Very well,” Harry sighed dramatically. “You’re forgiven.” Jenny made an impatient gesture for him to continue. “All right,” he said, “there are actually three reasons: first, although I love Monty, he only has about six decent anecdotes and I’ve heard them all several times; second, I _really_ don’t want to sit with Janice _or_ Madeline, because they absolutely despise me and I only have room in my life for _one_ person who despises me—”

“I do not _despise_ you—”

“You did once,” he pointed out.

“I was merely extremely judgemental of your attire, behaviour, and personality. What’s the third reason?”

“It’s the _best_ reason, in my opinion—which is the—”

“—the only one that matters,” Jenny finished mockingly. “Hurry up, before I leave you for Monty. I hear he knows _six_ very lovely stories.”

“You’d never make it there in those shoes. The third reason is that, because I helped with the seating arrangements, I got to pick the people who we would be sharing a table with—namely, six people who have friends at other tables—”

Jenny understood, looking at the now-empty chairs of their tablemates. “Whose tables coincidentally all have vacant seats?”

“Precisely, which means that we get _this_ one to ourselves.” He leaned in and gave her a kiss on the cheek. “And you’re spared the ordeal of small talk, which I know you hate.”

She looked at him, impressed. “That’s almost touching, for you.”

“I don’t get to see you very often. I wanted to make sure you enjoyed yourself at least a little.”

“This was a rather excessive amount of effort to go to,” Jenny said, gesturing at the room full of alumni.

“Well, I also wanted it to be memorable. It would be something we could reminisce about for years to come.”

Something in the way he said that was unbearably sad, which was when she stopped ignoring the awful reality of their situation. “We only have tonight, don’t we?” she said quietly.

He nodded. “Probably not even the entire night. A few hours at most.”

She laced the fingers of her right hand through his left hand, feeling the faint pressure of his ring in the space between her fingers.

“How long has it been?” he asked abruptly.

“Since when?”

“Since you first turned me down. How long has it been for you?”

“A year,” the Doctor said after a brief pause, “give or take a few weeks. How about you?”

The Master’s response was immediate: “Five hundred sixty-two days, eighteen hours, and forty-three minutes.”

“You counted?”

“Of course I counted.” For a moment, he looked at her with an intensity that made a shiver run down her spine—and then laughed a little self-consciously. “Time Lord. It’s part of the package, isn’t it?”

The Doctor removed her hand from his. “Well, I’ve never been particularly good at being a Time Lord,” she joked.

An icy silence ensued and she could tell that the Master was weighing whether or not to say the obvious out loud: _You never were a Time Lord. You were always something else._

Instead, he glanced at his watch. “It’s nine o’clock. Time for your next clue.”

The Doctor sighed, unsure if she was annoyed or relieved by the change in subject. “Go on, then.”

“This one’s a bit of a twofer: it’s not from Earth—”

“I could have guessed that, you know,” she pointed out.

“Which is why I decided to give you another little clue: it’s broken.”

“That’s not very helpful.”

The Master grinned. “Well, you’ll have to stay tuned to find out the next thrilling part of this mystery. In the meantime…”

He looked over the room, full of what was probably dull conversation by mildly interesting people— _little flies,_ the Doctor could almost hear him sneer. In truth, she didn’t much like the way _she_ was looking over the room either: constantly checking for danger, for clues— 

_(—and for Ryan and Yaz,_ even though she hoped that they _weren’t_ around to see all this—)

—and she felt so separate from everyone here. Separate… and lonely.

“In the meantime,” she said, picking up where the Master had trailed off, “could we go back to being them for a little while?”

At least then, she wouldn’t be alone.

“Of course,” he said, and kissed her.

When their lips parted, she was relieved to see Harry’s eyes gazing into her own.

“I love you,” Jenny whispered.

“Whatever time we’ve got tonight,” he said, “let’s make the most of it.”

Jenny glanced over his shoulder. “Are they setting out dessert already?”

Harry burst out laughing, but Jenny was already halfway out of her chair.

* * *

It was a bit ironic, Ryan thought to himself, that not long after he’d joked to Yaz about not having to do the washing up as a kid, he was intercepted by Ed and ordered to scrub what looked like an entire restaurant’s-worth of pots and pans. 

On top of that, his headache was getting worse. He’d never had a migraine before, but his Nan would get them sometimes and would have to lie down in her bedroom with all the lights off and the curtains closed, because the light made it worse. “It’s absolute agony, love,” she told him once. “Sometimes it’s so bad that I start seeing things.”

“What, like hallucinations?” he asked.

“Something like that,” Nan said. “It’s like everything has an aura around it.”

Maybe it was the harshness of the light in the kitchen, or the fact that he’d been staring at stainless steel pans for the last hour, but his vision was starting to get… weird. Not just from the bulbs, either: every surface, object, or person around him was glowing faintly as though surrounded by their own individual halos. 

Shutting his eyes for a minute or so seemed to help, but its effectiveness was dropping each time.

They’d come here to find a temporal anomaly, and now Ryan felt like something was doing an excavation project inside his skull. It had to be related somehow.

He sighed. Or maybe he’d just caught Graham’s cold.

Once he had emerged from sanitiser hell, Yaz was nowhere to be found.

She must have gotten lucky, he assumed, and found a way out of the kitchen and into the rest of the house. 

Luck was finally on his side too, and Ryan spotted his chance: they were loading up carts with desserts and getting ready to wheel them out into the dining room. 

“Hey, mate,” he said to the most exhausted-looking staff member he could see near the carts, “I can take over, if you want.”

“Oh, bless you,” the man sighed. “I’m gasping for a smoke.” He practically ran for the back door.

Making sure the buttons of his shirt were still in place, Ryan grabbed one of the carts and followed the others out of the kitchen.

He knew that it wasn’t a small gathering, but it was still a bit overwhelming to see all of these people in a _giant_ ballroom.

“I thought this place looked big on the outside,” he muttered.

It took some time for each cart to unload their contents onto one of the buffet tables on the sides of the ballroom, so Ryan took the opportunity to examine the area. Everything seemed basically normal—well, considering the circumstances, at least—and he was about to look for a side hall he could sneak down when he heard a voice just briefly over the crowd:

“…well, it was only _partially_ my doing, really: Janice is the one who did all of the fiddly bits…” 

He knew that voice. 

_(“Take my hand,” the Master ordered the Doctor, wielding a device that Ryan didn’t recognise but was obviously some kind of weapon, “or I turn them into tiny human dolls right here.”)_

Ryan’s heart rate sped up. It was the Master. The Master was _here,_ and the Doctor hadn’t answered any of her texts, which meant that he must have done something— 

_(“Fine,” the Doctor snapped. “I’ll play your game.” She turned back to Ryan and the others. “I’ll be back,” she reassured them._

_“She won’t,” the Master interjected, “and it’s not a game.” He grabbed the Doctor by the hand and pulled her towards the portal. “Good luck, humans.”)_

She must be here somewhere, probably captured, or maybe the Master had chucked her into another dimension like he had when they were on Barton’s plane—but more likely, she was somewhere in this massive house, so he should start searching— 

It seemed to descend on him all at once: another headache, lancing through his skull like a bolt of lightning, and everything around him glowed brighter and brighter with a radiance that came from everywhere and nowhere. Even with his eyes closed, it was so bright that it burned.

“You all right there?” he heard someone say, but he could barely make them out over the pounding in his head. A pair of hands helped guide him out into the hallway, but he couldn't see anything other than the terrible radiance around him—

_“…you've got…”_

This time, there was a voice: not the person helping him out of the ballroom, but one as bright and harsh as the light itself, and just as difficult to comprehend—

_“…got something around…”_

He saw the vaguest outline of a figure—and then it was gone: the voice, the light, and the pain.

Ryan rubbed his fingers against his temples as his breathing returned to normal. 

“—should I get someone?” asked the young woman at his side.

He shook his head. “I’m fine.” 

“You sure? You seemed well out of it just then.”

Ryan did his best to smile. “I’m feeling better. Really.”

“Promise?” she said sceptically.

“Promise,” he confirmed. “Though, er, if I nipped out early would you tell Ed?” He really didn’t want to deal with _that_ confrontation on top of everything else.

She rolled her eyes. “Of course I’m not going to tell him. Besides, it’s not like he’d notice: he’s getting chewed out right now by some ginger b—”

“Great,” Ryan interrupted, taking one last peek inside the ballroom.

The Master was here, there was a temporal anomaly, and now Ryan was seeing and hearing things that weren’t there. This couldn’t be a coincidence. He needed to find a way into the rest of the house and start searching, and now that he was out of the kitchen he had a chance—

He turned and nearly ran headlong into the Doctor.

“Sorry!” she said. “I was just—”

“Doctor?” Ryan said, still feeling a bit out of it and now very confused by her new outfit. Though he supposed that explained why she had vanished: she had gone back to the TARDIS to change.

Still, it was weird.

What was even weirder, though, was that, for a moment, she looked at Ryan like she didn’t know who he was.

“Doctor?” he repeated.

She blinked. “Ryan!” Alarmed, she grabbed him by the sleeve and dragged him further down the hall just outside the ballroom. “What are you doing here?”

“Yaz and I snuck in through the kitchen like we planned. What happened to _you?”_ No, he decided before she could answer, there was a more pressing matter: “The Master’s here,” he said urgently.

“I know.” She didn’t seem fazed, and Ryan couldn’t tell if it was a good thing or a bad thing. 

“Does he know you’re here?”

“Yes. But he doesn’t know that _you’re_ here, so stay out of sight.”

“I haven’t had much of a choice so far,” he grumbled.

“Where’s Yaz?”

Ryan frowned. “She hasn’t been out here?”

“No.”

“She must have found a way into the rest of the house, then. What are you going to do about the Master?”

Unexpectedly, the Doctor looked… cagey. “I’m going to go back in there. Whatever’s about to happen, whatever the source of the anomaly is, it won’t be for another few hours. If I stay at his side, I can keep tabs on what he’s doing.”

“And he’ll just let you?”

Now she looked even _more_ uncomfortable. “We’re both pretending to be alumni. If I expose him for who he really is, he’ll out me as well, and vice versa.”

“Hang on,” Ryan said, looking at the banners and remembering something from almost a year ago. “Wasn’t St Luke’s the place where the other Doctor was staying? That creepy lady on his TARDIS mentioned it.”

Her eyes widened for a moment, and then she nodded hastily. “Yes, that’s how I got this cover story.”

“What about him?”

“What about the time he was undercover in MI6? He’s good at infiltrating places!” she snapped. “He lured me here with that temporal anomaly and the only way I’m going to figure it out is if I keep watching him the whole evening, which means that I need _you_ to watch everything else. You _and_ Yaz, all right?” 

“All right, all right, no need to bite my head off,” Ryan said, annoyed. He gave her a closer look. “Your hair’s doing a thing.”

“Yes,” she said, embarrassed. 

“Your hair never does a thing.”

“Yes, well…” she muttered something too quickly and too quietly for Ryan to hear.

“What?”

“The Master brought hair mousse with him,” she grumbled, slightly louder. _“And_ this outfit, and—look, that’s not important. He knew I was coming, so I need you to stay alert. There’s a trap here somewhere, I know it.”

“He brought you _clothes?”_

“I said it’s not important!” she sputtered. “Stay out of sight—if he finds out you’re here, we’ll lose the element of surprise.”

“Fine,” Ryan said. He felt a faint pounding sensation behind his eyes, but couldn't tell if it was the remnants of his recent migraine, the beginnings of a new one, or if it was just irritation at the Doctor’s odd behaviour. 

Speaking of which, he should tell the Doctor about—

“Gotta go,” she said quickly, and dashed back into the ballroom.

Before Ryan could even begin to grapple with this new complication—because anything involving the Master was a complication _at best—_ someone hissed at him to help bring the empty carts back to the kitchen.

He tried to decide which of them was dealing with the bigger headache: himself or the Doctor.

* * *

“You’re kidding,” Jenny said, looking at the far side of the ballroom in disbelief.

“I’m not,” Harry replied with a grin.

“Dancing? Seriously?” The event staff were opening a set of double doors, and she could faintly hear music over the noise of conversations. “And why does this monstrosity of a house have a _second ballroom?”_

“For events just like these, probably.” He stood and offered her a hand. “Let’s go.”

She didn’t move. “You _hate_ my dancing.”

“No, I don’t.”

“You once asked me if I was descended from a species with more than two legs.”

“I was teasing you.”

“You call me uncoordinated on a regular basis,” she pointed out.

“And it is a quality of yours that I adore,” Harry said. He offered his hand again. “So: may I have this dance?”

Jenny sighed, but couldn’t keep the smile off of her face. “All right.” She took his hand and let him pull her to her feet.

Now that dinner was over, the attendees were milling around and chatting. A few had gone to take a peek at the adjacent room, but otherwise it was empty aside from the musicians. 

“We’re the only ones in here,” Jenny protested as she followed him in. 

Harry snickered. “Did I hear that correctly? You, _Jenny Smith,_ are actually worried about looking _silly?”_

“That’s not—all right, _maybe,”_ she admitted.

“Maybe we’ll start a trend,” he joked, then his expression softened. “I want to dance with you, even if it costs me my dignity and possibly a few of my toes.” He made a slight bow. “Shall we?”

She smiled and took his hand again. “Let’s dance.”

“I’m leading,” Harry whispered, annoyed, after a few bumps and other near-catastrophes.

“Why do you get to lead?”

“Because it was my idea!”

Jenny scowled. “Next song, we switch.”

The next song, however, was distracting enough that she forgot. 

“Is this…” she asked, trying to concentrate on the jazzy tune, “Is this _‘Poker Face’?”_

Harry gave her a sly grin. “I was the one who did the booking. I made a request.”

She laughed. “From our first trip in the TARDIS.”

“From that ridiculous adventure on the colony ship when we had to literally dance for our lives.”

Jenny shook her head and laughed again. “This is ridiculous. _You’re_ ridiculous.”

“Why?”

She risked falling over by letting go of his hand and gesturing to the room. “All of this. A St Luke’s reunion in a manor house that would make Queen Victoria lose her temper, these outfits, the music… and you did _all of this_ for me?”

“Like I said before: I wanted to make it a night to remember.”

“You didn’t have to go to all this trouble, you know.” 

“Sure,” he conceded, “but I figured: why not go big?”

They stopped dancing and she rested her hand on his cheek. “I will always remember this night,” she said softly, “but not because of any of this. I’m going to remember it because I spent it with you.”

Their eyes met for a moment, but then Harry looked away. “They’ll have to remember it too.”

The ache in her heart—hearts—was physically painful.

“Let’s get some air,” he said. “There’s a little balcony-type thing through those doors.”

Now outside, leaning against the stone wall surrounding the terrace, she was able to breathe again. 

Keeping her gaze fixed on the garden in the distance, the Doctor laughed ruefully. “Can you imagine what it would have been like if we’d had one of these events for the Academy?”

The Master emitted a nearly identical laugh as he joined her. “It would have put the gaudiness of this one to shame.”

“The robes and hats alone would have been an onslaught on the senses.”

“And the absolute terror _we_ would have caused just by showing up,” he said. “We’d scare the pomp right out of them.”

“The unholy duo,” the Doctor said with a grin. “Koschei and Theta.”

“Unholy _trio:_ don’t forget Ushas.”

“Ooo, I called her that once, a few hundred years back. She was _very_ unhappy with me.” 

The Master shrugged. “I supposed I’d be a bit spiky about that as well. We’re rather attached to our chosen names, after all.”

She snorted. “Your attachment to _your_ name borders on kink, you know.”

“Only when you’re the one saying it, love,” he replied with a leer.

The Doctor rolled her eyes. They were silent for a while, but it was an almost-comfortable silence, standing side by side in the night air, looking at the stars that were just starting to light up the sky. 

“Do you think she’s still out there?” she asked.

“The Rani?”

“I assume she wasn’t there when you had your tantrum.” The Doctor tried to keep her voice even, despite the bitterness curdling in her stomach. “You’d have said something about it by now.” She turned to face him directly. “Would you have killed her if she was?”

To her surprise, the Master seemed to be thinking it over. “I _think_ I would have spared her. Hard to know for sure, of course: I didn’t have a pesky human conscience bothering me back then.”

“I never found out if she survived the War. Did you?”

He shook his head. 

“Of course,” the Doctor continued, “if there was anyone who would have been so distracted by a research project in the middle of nowhere that she _completely missed_ a universe-spanning conflict that nearly tore the fabric of reality to pieces, it would have been her.”

He laughed—almost cackled, really. “One of these days she’s going to pop up again and go _‘What did I miss?’”_

The Doctor joined in the laughter, despite the awful topic of conversation. “You’re the one who’ll have to tell her about Gallifrey, not me.”

“She’ll probably just shrug and then go back to whatever absurd thing she was working on.”

She snickered. “Transmuting lead into antimatter.”

“Turning a Slitheen inside-out,” he suggested.

“Grafting bunny ears onto an Ood.”

They both broke out in giggles and, for one golden moment, everything was okay: she was with her best friend and nothing awful had ever come between them.

And just like when they were young, she wanted to run away with him: to see every star together, like they promised.

But that moment ended and they went back to being what they really were: old, broken, and complicated.

The Master looked at his watch. “Ten o’clock,” he said. “Here’s your clue, and it’s a good one: this item was part of a set of assets that had been held in legal limbo for the last fifteen years or so.”

“That’s not a good clue.” Even so, her mind was turning his words over and over, trying to wrest some kind of meaning from them. 

Something clicked: “I’m going to recognise it, aren’t it? It’s something from my past?”

 _“Our_ past,” he corrected her. “And yes, you’ll know it when you see it.”

Now the Doctor was on high alert again: anything that involved herself and the Master, particularly on Earth, was bound to be extremely dangerous. 

“Come on,” the Master said. “The speeches are starting soon and I’m on the roster.”

“Oh good, another monologue,” she grumbled, following him back inside.

“Could be worse,” he said. “I could have tied you up for it.”

She responded by giving a rather forceful shove to the center of his back. His ensuing yelp drew the attention of a few couples who had joined in the dancing.

“She just can’t keep her hands off of me!” the Master cried cheerfully.

“Let’s go, _dear,_ or you’ll be late,” the Doctor growled, giving him another, though slightly less violent, shove out of the room.

* * *

“How do you not get lost every time you leave your room?” Yaz asked, turning what felt like another identical corner on what was either the third floor or possibly a smaller half-floor between the second and third floors. 

“I’ve lived here my whole life, other than when I’m away at school,” Kayla replied. “At this point I could navigate the place blindfolded.”

“Which is sort of what it feels like,” Yaz pointed out. They had more or less wandered around in the dark for most of the ‘tour,’ except for a few notable rooms where Kayla had turned on a single light, flopped down into the the nearest chair or couch, and then rattled off the name, purpose, and history—half of which Yaz was convinced she was making up off the top of her head.

“What’s the point of sneaking around if you’re doing it with all the lights on?” Kayla demanded. “Come on, this way,” she directed, grabbing Yaz by the hand. “If you wander off, I might never find you again,” she laughed.

Yaz laughed too, though inside she was experiencing a somewhat bizarre mix of anxiety, confusion, and excitement. They really didn’t _need_ to hold hands—Kayla’s running commentary was more than enough to keep Yaz from getting lost—and she was beginning to suspect that her new acquaintance might have other motives behind it.

Or maybe not? People who lived by themselves in the middle of nowhere were often eccentric, and perhaps dragging a member of the catering staff around the house—after lending her clothes and makeup—was Kayla’s particular eccentricity.

On the other hand, Yaz could practically hear her friend Aisha groaning in her mind: _I swear to god, Yaz, you wouldn’t recognise flirting if it hit you with a lorry._

 _All right, maybe you have a point,_ Yaz told the imaginary-Aisha. _But it’s a hell of an assumption if it turns out that you’re_ _wrong_ _. Besides,_ she added indignantly, _I_ _can_ _tell when people are flirting with me—sometimes._

 _And isn’t it interesting that all of those times are when you haven’t the slightest bit of interest in them?_ Imaginary-Aisha countered.

 _Shut up,_ Yaz said hastily.

_Apparently socially-awkward girls who drag you around while rambling about history is your Type._

Beside her, Kayla was trying and failing to open the doors of each room that they passed in this hallway.

“What are you doing?” Yaz asked.

“Dad’s having a few guests spend the night after the party’s over,” she explained.

“So you want to break into their rooms and snoop through their stuff?”

“Well, obviously,” Kayla said with a laugh.

“You know, we still haven’t _gone_ to this party yet,” Yaz pointed out.

“We’ll get there eventually. It ends at eleven and it’s not even half-past-ten yet.” She tried yet another doorknob and scowled in disappointment, before turning and smiling at Yaz. “And this is probably more exciting than that gaudy mess downstairs anyway.”

“Really? I thought you’d be bored walking through all of this again.”

“If I was by myself, sure. But that’s the fun of having someone to show around: it lets you see the same old stuff with fresh eyes.”

Something about the way Kayla said that was so familiar that Yaz actually wondered for a moment if she had stumbled across one of the Doctor’s other regenerations.

_Okay, maybe I do have a Type._

“Well,” Yaz said, “it _has_ been interesting, looking around your ancestral home.”

 _“‘Ancestral’?”_ To her surprise, Kayla burst out laughing. “Far from it: it’s only belonged to my family for a century at most. Dad’s granddad made a fortune supplying something for the war effort—can’t remember which war—got a peerage, and I guess he thought a country manor was a necessity, so he bought this behemoth. In the grand scheme of things we’re _very_ nouveau riche, but it’s not like anyone cares these days.”

“Oh.” A century didn’t sound like ‘new’ money, in Yaz’s opinion, but she decided not to argue the point.

“Don’t be embarrassed! It’s all rubbish anyway. All of this money and stuff means that I haven’t got a clue about anything or what I want to do with my life. I’ve never had to consider it.” She turned to Yaz. “What about you? I mean, I assume that catering isn’t your dream job—though maybe it is? I don’t want to jump to conclusions, obviously.”

“Police,” Yaz said. “I’m still probationary at the moment, which mostly just means dealing with smaller things like arguments when someone scratches up a parked car… but soon, you’ll be looking at PC Yasmin K—Afzal,” she corrected herself quickly, using the surname of the pseudonym from when she and Ryan infiltrated Vor. Giving her real name could make things very awkward if Kayla ever tried to look her up: Yaz had no idea what she would be doing in 2022—hopefully still travelling with the Doctor—but it wasn’t clear what would happen if a bored heiress turned up in Sheffield looking for her.

“Ooo, so am I going to be in trouble for all this attempted breaking and entering?” Kayla teased.

“I’m off-duty,” Yaz countered with a laugh. 

“And you’re doing catering things on the weekend for extra cash?”

“Yes,” she confirmed, though in truth, when she was with the Hallamshire Police, she was usually working nights and weekends. “It doesn’t pay much.”

“And you’ve always wanted to be one?”

“Not always,” she replied, “but for years, yeah.”

“Oh, that’s just brilliant!” Kayla marvelled, then sighed. “I’ve never known what I wanted to be. Neither did Dad: he just has a series of Things that he’s interested in, which is mostly golf and gardening—though I think Harry’s getting him interested in collecting rare minerals or something. I suppose I need to figure out what my Thing is going to be, since my main filial obligations boil down to _‘hire a good investment adviser, don’t do something stupid enough to land in the papers, and don’t sell the house,’_ though that last one’s more of a very strong suggestion.” She shrugged. “I think I’ll probably settle on travelling, though I’m not allowed to go on my own since Dad’s afraid that I’ll go on holiday and never come back to finish school. Oh, I suppose that's my other obligation: _‘get the diploma.’_ But in the meantime, I’m stuck here for the summers, where my only social life is texting.” 

“That sounds lonely.”

“It is.” Her expression softened. “I’m so glad I met you, Yaz. I suppose I’m not all that different from Dad: I’m not clever or all that interesting, but I do have his knack for meeting clever and interesting people.”

“That’s quite the compliment,” Yaz said, feeling her cheeks warm a little. 

“That’s why I said it.”

Before she really had a chance to think it over, she asked Kayla: “You sure your father wouldn’t let you go on _one_ trip? Just for a weekend?”

Her eyes widened. “Why? Are you offering?”

Yaz gave her a sly grin. “Might be.” 

_The TARDIS is bigger on the inside. There’s always room for one more._

Kayla replied with a grin of her own. “Where did you have in mind?”

“Take your pick.” _All of time and space,_ she wanted to say, but Yaz figured that she would wait until this temporal anomaly mess was over to spring _that_ particular revelation on her. 

And if it was just for one trip—or at least that’s how Yaz would explain it to the Doctor— 

_Oh, forget about the Doctor for a second!_

It was true, because at this moment, all she was really thinking about was Kayla: Kayla, with her hazel-green eyes and her hand still warm in Yaz’s own; Kayla, whose gaze was saying something that Yaz could almost decipher if she looked a little closer; Kayla, who was now leaning in, lips parted, while Yaz leaned in as well— 

Yaz’s phone chimed with the notification of an incoming text message.

Biting back a curse, she pulled her mobile out of the pocket of her dress. “Sorry,” she apologised.

It was from Ryan: _we've got a situation. meet me out back._

Yaz sighed. “My friend needs a hand with something.” Seeing Kayla’s downcast face, she added: “Do you want to come?”

The girl’s expression brightened up. “Sure! Does it involve moving boxes or something?”

“I hope not. Which way do we go?”

“The stairs round the corner are probably quickest,” Kayla directed; however, they had only gone a few meters when she stopped suddenly. “Hmm…” she murmured. “I wonder if—” She tried the knob and the door opened. “No way,” she said, astonished. “No _way!”_

“What?”

“This is Harry Jones’s room!” she said excitedly. “I’ve _never_ gotten the opportunity to snoop around in there: he always locks the door.” She laughed. “He must be _really_ distracted by that wife of his. Come on, we can spare a minute before meeting your friend, can’t we?” 

It was just an ordinary bedroom at first glance: an unmade bed, an open closet door, a few articles of clothes on the floor that were obviously from when they were changing for— 

Yaz stopped breathing. “Oh my god.”

“What?” Kayla asked. She was in the middle of rifling through the items in the closet, but Yaz couldn’t take her eyes off of the floor, where a long grey coat lay beside a familiar t-shirt and short trousers with brightly-coloured braces clipped to them.

And the boots. The Doctor might occasionally change her clothes, but she never changed those boots.

“Yaz? What’s going on?” Kayla went to her side.

“Those are her clothes,” Yaz said, almost unable to form the words. 

“Yeah, they’re probably his wife’s—Yaz? Where are you going?”

“To find Ryan,” she replied, running out of the room and heading for the stairs.

 _The Doctor’s here and those are her clothes… those are her_ _clothes_ _… what happened to her that her_ _clothes_ _are on the floor of the room of some random friend of Kayla’s father, someone who was organising—_

_No._

But she had wondered before, earlier in the day when she and Ryan were talking about the texting, only it was impossible, it was— 

There was a voice from downstairs: “…and the experiences we’ve all had at St Luke’s have shaped us in so many ways…”

That voice.

“Yaz, what’s wrong?” Kayla said, catching up with her right as they reached the bottom of the stairs.

It was coming from inside the ballroom, amplified by a microphone: “…some of us went on to be luminaries in our chosen fields: science, finance, law, public service…”

“I know that voice,” Yaz said; her voice was shaking.

“You do?”

_(“Stick with me, Yaz,” he said with a grin that was light-years away from the smile he had worn only minutes before, “because I control… everything.”)_

“...some of us were inspired to build and to create: companies, inventions, charitable organisations, art and music…” the speaker went on as Yaz reached the door to the ballroom.

_(“Even these guys.” He whistled, snapped his fingers, and spun around on his heels as the cabin of Barton’s plane lit up with the presence of two Kasaavin.)_

He was even wearing the same tuxedo.

“…but for some of us,” the Master said, standing on a chair at one of the tables at the far end of the room, “our time at St Luke’s gave us something even more special: the relationships we formed while we were there. Friendships—maybe a few nemeses—” The audience laughed. “—and, for the luckiest of us, the love of a lifetime.”

“How do you know Harry Jones?” Kayla asked, peering over her shoulder.

He continued: “If it hadn’t been for St Luke’s University, I would have missed out on the discovery that changed my life.” The Master looked down at someone that Yaz couldn’t see with an expression that, if she didn’t know better, she would have called _loving._ “The most impossible, infuriating, incredible person I have ever met: my wife, Jenny Smith.”

Most of the audience _aww-_ ed; a few clusters groaned. 

Ice crawled up Yaz’s spine as the target of the Master’s adoring gaze got to her feet, and he leaned down to kiss her.

She was dressed in different clothes and her hair was styled a bit differently, but she was unmistakable.

“Yaz?” Kayla asked.

“All right, everyone!” the Master said, laughing a little bashfully (or it would have been bashful if Yaz didn’t know the real him). “You’ve endured enough of my rambling, so I’m going to turn this over to Janice to finish it up.” He jumped from the chair to the floor. “Thank you all for coming and goodnight!”

The woman who took the mic from him was the redhead she and Ryan saw smoking outside earlier, but Yaz could barely hear the remarks over the pounding of her own heartbeat in her ears as she watched the Master and the Doctor locked in a passionate embrace.

She turned and ran.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I promise, this is the last chapter of Ryan being stuck in the kitchen.


	4. If You Want to Strike Me Down in Anger

Ryan wanted to tell himself that he was growing increasingly impatient, but the truth was that he was also growing increasingly _worried._ Yaz hadn’t responded to his text, the Master was planning _something_ here, the Doctor was distracted and acting weirder than normal—and there seemed to be nothing that Ryan could do about any of those things except _wait._

He was hiding behind the van where they kept the snacks and water for the staff, and glaring down at his mobile like it had done something to personally insult him. So far, no one had come looking for him, which was good because, from the sound of it, they were starting to clean up and Ryan would have honestly preferred to face down a literal alien invasion than scrub more pans.

 _All right,_ he said to himself, trying to calm his anxiety by pretending that the Doctor was here and in her usual Take Charge Mode, _what do we know?_

The Master was here, but at least this time they knew that he was here _before_ he unleashed some horrible _thing_ on everyone. The Doctor, although irritated and uncomfortable, was probably fine—at least she hadn’t been captured or something. The house was full of people and, apart from Yaz, there hadn’t been any mysterious disappearances that he knew of, so it wasn’t like they were being attacked by Cybermen or Kasaavin, for instance. Whatever was going to happen, according to the Doctor, it wouldn’t happen for another few hours. 

He had been careful to keep his ears open for anything out of the ordinary among the caterers or the guests, but it was the usual complaints: too little of one thing, too much of another, complaints about what someone was saying, insults about what someone was wearing, a lot of… _unique_ insults about that Mr Jones guy and his wife, and the tired gossip that happened among any group of people who vaguely knew one another and had to pretend to be on good terms for a few hours.

But he probably missed things as well, because he’d had two more of those… _attacks,_ where the faint halos around everyone sharpened into brutal jagged edges of light and pain, while the ringing in his ears morphed into the rasp of almost-words: _…something around your…_

And then nothing: the light and noise would recede before he could figure out what he was seeing or hearing.

This wasn’t a coincidence, and Ryan was tired of waiting around and letting things happen _to_ him instead of doing something himself.

He had just made up his mind to go back into the house to find Yaz, despite the risk of running into Ed, when Yaz found him. She was in tears, a panic, and a really nice black dress.

“What happened?” he said, catching her by the arms as she nearly barrelled right into him.

“Ryan! It’s him, he’s here—”

“The Master?” he said. “I know, the Doctor told me—”

“Did you talk to her?” Yaz demanded. “Did she say anything?”

“Yeah, she said she was pretending to be an alum so she could keep an eye on him—”

Yaz’s laugh was surprisingly bitter. “Oh, she’s definitely keeping _something_ on him,” she said with a grimace.

Ryan looked at her more closely: she was _shaking._ “Yaz, what did you—”

He was interrupted by the arrival of a purple-haired girl who was obviously one of the guests. “Yaz?” she said, sounding worried. “What was that? What’s going on?”

Yaz was still making that horrible bitter expression. _“That’s_ Harry Jones, then?”

“The hundred kilos of smarm in a fifty kilo package?” the girl replied. “Yeah, that was him. Do you know him from somewhere?”

Ryan’s eyes widened. “That’s not—”

“It is,” Yaz confirmed. “He pretended to be a St Luke’s student, befriended her dad, and is using him for something—”

“Who’s her dad?” Ryan asked.

“The host.” The girl gave a little wave. “Hi. I’m Kayla Curnow. I, er, live here.”

Apparently Yaz’s infiltration had gone _much_ better than his. “So you’ve seen him before?” he asked.

Kayla kept looking back and forth between Ryan and Yaz in confusion (Ryan) and concern (Yaz). “Yeah, they’ve been chums for a couple years. He comes down to stay the weekend every so often—”

Ryan groaned. “Years? Then who _knows_ what he’s been able to set up here?”

“Uh… catch me up here,” Kayla said. “So you apparently know him, but under a different name—ooo,” she paused, before continuing on excitedly, “is he some kind of con artist?”

“Worse,” Yaz spat. “He’s a murderer. Do you remember that thing with Vor about two years ago when everyone’s phones tried to take them over—?”

Kayla squinted at her, puzzled. “The big network outage?”

“What? No!”

“Yaz,” Ryan reminded her. “We’re the only ones who saw it up close.”

“Wait, did _he_ cause the Vor outage?” Kayla asked, still excited.

“He tried to kill us,” Ryan said wearily. “The two of us, my granddad, and our friend, the Doctor. Have you seen her, by the way? Blonde hair—”

For some reason, Yaz started crying again, burying her face into Ryan’s shoulder. “Yaz, what’s going on? Did something happen to her?”

“She’s been like this ever since we took a peek into the ballroom,” Kayla explained. “Harry was making a speech and said some nauseatingly sweet things about his wife—”

“His _wife?”_ Ryan exclaimed. 

“And then they basically shoved their tongues down the other’s throat and Yaz—oh,” Realisation dawned on her face. “She was blonde—that’s your friend, isn’t it?”

“Yaz,” Ryan said as gently as he could, despite the pit of horror opening up in his stomach. “Was it her?”

Her voice was muffled, but still audible: “Yes.”

“Oh my god… do you think he’s…?” _‘Making her’_ were the words that Ryan wanted to use, but also did _not_ want to use because the idea was monstrous. When he talked to the Doctor earlier, she didn’t seem like she was being coerced, but what if she was just lying to keep Ryan out of danger?

“I mean…” Kayla said, looking a little uncomfortable, “I’m not an expert, obviously, but she didn’t look especially… reluctant. She also looked sober,” she added, “so I don’t think he drugged her or anything.”

Even though what Ryan _wanted_ to do right now was head back inside and attempt to break the Master down into his component parts (and probably get either zapped or arrested in the process), Yaz was still shaking in his arms and the catering staff would probably be flooding the area any minute now loading up the vans. “We need to get back inside,” he told Kayla. “Somewhere we can regroup.”

She nodded, then grinned. “If there’s one thing this house has, it’s plenty of space.”

“Somewhere the Master can’t find us.”

“Is that his alias?” She snickered. “Kinky.”

“He once blew up a plane while we were inside of it.”

“Ugh. All right, I can see why you’d want to avoid him,” Kayla conceded. “Well, it’ll be a bit tricky getting inside without being seen, since I think our security staff are going to be making the rounds soon, looking for _unauthorised guests—”_ She rolled her eyes. “But once we get upstairs, I know the one spot in the house that Harry Jones—sorry, _the Master—_ won’t ever think to set foot in.”

“Where’s that?”

She smirked. “My bedroom, of course.”

Ryan still felt uneasy. “Are you _sure_ he won’t come by?”

Kayla laughed as she led the way towards what looked like the backdoor to a sunroom. “Hell, I tried inviting him once. He was not interested at _all_ —what?” she demanded in response to Ryan’s expression. “I didn’t know he was a plane-exploding murderer, I just thought he was cute!”

“Trust me, mate,” Ryan said, “he’s way too old for you.”

“By what, fifteen years?”

“Try ‘several hundred.’”

_“What?”_

“Yeah, we’ve got some explaining we need to do.” He shook Yaz, who hadn’t let go of him the entire time. “Yaz, can you make it up the stairs?”

Still looking a little catatonic, Yaz nodded.

“Your shirt’s missing a button,” Kayla told him as they went up a back staircase.

“It’s not my shirt,” he grumbled.

“What’s the key to?”

“My flat,” Ryan lied. He could faintly feel his copy of the TARDIS key pressing against his chest, which was now slightly more visible than he would have preferred.

“Just around this corner,” Kayla whispered once they were upstairs, pointing at the hallway to her right, but they heard a sound to their left that made Ryan—and Yaz, if the way she stiffened next to him was any indication—freeze in alarm. 

One voice was burned into Ryan’s brain through sheer trauma if nothing else, and the other voice was one that was so familiar that he could never mistake it for anyone else’s.

Not in the hallway—thank heavens for _that,_ Ryan thought to himself—but behind one of the closed doors. 

“Oh,” Kayla whispered. “They must have gone to bed, then.”

Breaking away from them, Yaz ran to the door of the bedroom. Ryan nearly called after her to not go in there, not until they could figure out a plan—but instead she paused, leaned against the wall, and had an expression on her face that indicated she was trying to listen to the conversation on the other side. 

Joining her, Ryan could hear the voices resolve into words:

“…brilliant piece of oratory, wasn’t it?” the Master said with a laugh.

The Doctor groaned. “I think I preferred it back when you were publicly insulting me,” she said.

He made a wordless squeak of offense. “I was speaking from the heart!” he protested.

“I know, it’s just…” For some reason, the Doctor sighed wearily. “This entire evening, you’ve been so over the top—even for you—and you don’t _have_ to be.”

“I told you, I wanted to—”

“I’m _here,”_ she interrupted. “I’m here, and nothing you do will make me _more_ here, all right?” Ryan heard the sound of someone sitting on the bed. “What is all of this leading up to?”

Everything about this situation was _extremely_ bizarre, but for some reason the most surreal thing was hearing the Doctor _ask_ for an answer instead of demanding it. 

Was she manipulating the Master in some way? Pretending to be with him in order to get him to disclose his plan?

The Master’s response, however, wasn’t what Ryan expected: “We could leave,” the Time Lord said—almost pleaded, really. “Just the two of us: leave here and go off somewhere.”

The Doctor’s reply was surprisingly gentle. “We can’t.” 

“Why not? It’s not like we don’t have plenty of options.”

“They’ll try to stop us. Both of them.”

Ryan tried not to audibly react. After everything she’d told Ryan about maintaining the element of surprise, the Doctor had apparently _told_ the Master that he and Yaz were here?

“I don’t care,” the Master retorted. His voice dropped to a whisper. “We are so much _better_ than they are—”

“I’m not arguing with you on that,” she replied. “They’re idiots.”

Ryan winced. Beside him, Yaz inhaled sharply.

“All of their nonsense and constant drama,” the Doctor continued disdainfully, “while _we_ have to fight for every little scrap of time we can be together… it’s exhausting, but that’s the way it is.”

She was obviously lying, Ryan knew—trying to put the Master at ease—but it still hurt to hear.

“Besides,” she said, “it’s pointless to plan anything, since they can obviously hear us right now.”

“Then let’s really mess with their heads,” the Master murmured. 

The muffled sounds from the other side of the door made it obvious what the two of them were up to now.

“Yikes,” Kayla said, which caused Ryan to nearly jump out of his skin in surprise.

“I think we’ve heard enough,” he said, feeling a bit queasy.

By the time the three of them arrived at Kayla’s room—which, for some reason, had dresses covering nearly every available surface—Ryan’s shock had mostly worn off and he was now trying to solve their latest problem.

“All right,” he said after Kayla closed the door, “she knew that we were eavesdropping, so she must have passed along some kind of clue—or wanted him to _think_ that she had passed us a clue.” He turned to Yaz. “Can you remember her exact words when she was talking about, what was it, being ‘more here’ or something? ‘Cause that was a weird way to phrase something and—”

Yaz gaped at him. “You really don’t get it, do you?” she said.

For a second, he thought she was talking about getting the _clue,_ but given how hurt she looked, Ryan suspected that it had to do with the other part of it. “Yaz, she was obviously _pretending_ to—”

“No, she wasn’t!”

“You know how good she is at lying,” Ryan argued.

“Yeah!” Yaz cried. “Lying to _us!_ We’ve been talking about this for months: how ever since she went off with him at the Boundary, she’s been acting weird and now we know why: she was sneaking around with _him!”_

“It’s a misunderstanding—”

She laughed bitterly. “I was even right about the texting thing… remember what I said earlier today before we were interrupted? The last person she’d been texting as much as she has lately—it was O! Of course it was him! It’s never anyone else!”

“Yaz!” Ryan said, appalled. “Do you really think that she’d be doing… _that…_ with him after everything he’s done to her?”

“And what _exactly_ has he done to _her?”_ Yaz demanded. 

“He keeps trying to kill her! The thing with the Kasaavin—”

“Oh right, the thing where he had her taken off to another dimension while the rest of us were left on a crashing plane! The thing where Barton’s big plan would only affect humans, meaning that she would have been immune! He’s never wanted to kill her! He’s only wanted to kill _us!”_

“And you think she wouldn’t _object_ to that?” Ryan asked incredulously.

“Do you remember the look on her face at the end of that incident?”

“I guess? She looked—”

“It wasn’t the same expression she typically gets when she saves the world,” Yaz interrupted. “It was the expression that she gets when she wins at Snap.” She shook her head in disgust. “It was like a _game_ for both of them: he spent years pretending to be an MI6 agent all so he could deliver the punchline to a _joke—”_

_“Oh…” the Doctor gasped in horror._

_The Master giggled at her reaction. “That’s my name, and_ _that_ _is why I chose it!”_

“—and after that was over, remember how she spent all that time trying to find him, and she only said something about it to us when we caught her at it?”

“Yeah, she said that he left her a message—”

“Did you ever think about what would have happened if she’d found him?” Yaz demanded. She went on before Ryan could reply: “It would have been a one-way trip back to Sheffield for you, me, and Graham.”

“She _did_ find him again at the Boundary,” Ryan objected, “and she came back to Sheffield to get us after it was over.”

Yaz laughed that awful bitter laugh again. “Face it, Ryan: they’re not humans, they’re _aliens._ Whatever weird messed-up relationship they have, we’re never going to understand it.”

“We don’t have to understand it in order to help her, Yaz.”

“Do you really think she needs our help?” When Ryan didn’t answer, she sighed. “This whole temporal anomaly thing was just a cover story. It was something to keep us busy while they went on a _date—”_

“Uh… guys?” Kayla interjected.

“What?” Yaz snapped, then winced. “Sorry. What is it?”

“What time is it on your mobiles?” she asked.

Ryan took his phone out of his pocket and checked. “10:18,” he said. 

“Same,” Yaz added.

“That’s what mine says too,” Kayla said. She looked troubled. “…except that when Yaz and I went downstairs earlier, it was around 10:20. So… can one of you catch me up on the whole ‘aliens and temporal anomalies’ thing?” 

* * *

Jenny’s boot made a slight dent in the paint when it hit the wall, but she was too relieved to care. “Ah…” she sighed happily, peeling off her socks and wiggling her bare toes. “That’s more like it.”

“They fit all right, didn’t they?” Harry asked, sounding a little concerned. 

“They fit perfectly,” Jenny reassured him, “but they’re not _my_ boots, so they were always doomed to suffer by comparison.”

“So I take it this is the last time I’m going to see you in that outfit?”

“It is.” She smirked.

He sighed melodramatically. “The only consolation I have about your disregard for anything resembling fashion is that you’re probably in a hurry to undress.”

With a laugh, Jenny pulled the blouse over her head and tossed it in the direction of where she had thrown her jacket earlier. “You’re right about that one.”

Harry, meanwhile, was busy putting his clothes on hangers. “So,” he said, with a note of teasing in his voice, “what did you think of my speech? It was a brilliant piece of oratory, wasn’t it?”

Jenny groaned. “I think I preferred it back when you were publicly insulting me,” she teased him.

He made a tiny offended noise. “I was speaking from the heart!”

“I know, it’s just…” She sighed wearily. “This entire evening, you’ve been _so_ over the top—even for you—and you don’t _have_ to.”

His expression softened. “I told you, I wanted to—”

“I’m _here,”_ she interrupted, beckoning him to join her on the bed. “I’m here, and nothing you do will make me _more_ here, all right?” She waited until he had sat down next to her. “What is all of this leading up to?”

 _Oh no, that’s not my question. That’s_ _her_ _question._

She tensed, waiting for herself to fade and the two Time Lords to resume their usual petty squabbling… but nothing happened. It was still just her and Harry, human and real and together.

“We could leave,” Harry said urgently. “Just the two of us: leave here and go off somewhere.”

“We can’t,” she said, shaking her head. What were they going to do, steal a car?

“Why not?” He took her hands in his. “It’s not like we don’t have plenty of options.”

“They’ll try to stop us. Both of them.” They would probably get halfway down the stairs and then the Doctor and the Master would show up again. It was a bit difficult to escape someone when you shared a body with them.

“I don’t care,” Harry retorted. His voice dropped to a whisper. “We are so much _better_ than they are—”

“I’m not arguing with you on that,” she replied, trying to stay calm. “They’re idiots. All of their nonsense and constant drama… while _we_ have to fight for every little scrap of time we can be together… it’s exhausting.” She squeezed his fingers. “But that’s the way it is. Besides,” she added, “it’s pointless to plan anything, since they can obviously hear us right now.”

Harry gave her a wicked grin and pulled her close. “Then let’s really mess with their heads.”

They did fade away eventually, but not before drowning themselves in a beautiful haze of _together._

After the day she’d just had, the Doctor could barely muster up the energy to say _Damn it,_ even inside her own head.

She rolled over and sighed. “They keep doing that, I’ve noticed.”

The Master sat up slowly. “What?” he asked.

 _“‘Messing with our heads,’”_ she said, using her fingers for air quotes.

He raised his eyebrows. “Are you complaining?” he asked mockingly.

“Oh, shush.” She sat up. “What time is it?”

He fumbled for his watch on the bedside table. “Would you look at that… it’s 11 PM. Time for your last clue.”

“Which is?”

“Say please.”

She sighed. “Please.”

“Say _‘please, Master.’”_

“Not until I’ve put my clothes on.” She got out of bed and started getting dressed.

“Come on, at least keep your trousers off,” he teased.

“Nope. Are you going to tell me or not?”

He briefly pouted. “Fine. This so-called ‘fiendish scheme’ of mine is actually intended to solve a problem that has been plaguing both of us. In fact,” the Master added, “I predict that by the end of this you will, without any coercion or blackmail on my part, end up thanking me for it.”

The _pride_ in his voice was enough to unnerve her. “You know,” the Doctor pointed out, “you could just _tell_ me what you’re doing.”

“You can’t expect me to go to all of this effort and not have a _little_ fun with it,” he protested. “It will be a very pleasant surprise—emphasis on _surprise.”_

The Doctor scowled. What she really wanted to do was track down Ryan and Yaz, but it was unlikely that the Master wouldn’t follow her.

“I know you’re trying to figure out how to stop this,” he said. “I can see it in your eyes. But there’s nothing you can do, so don’t bother.”

She sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. “When is the delivery arriving?”

“Midnight. Nothing to do but wait.”

She could just leave. Run for the door, maybe lock him in the bedroom on her way out. Figure out a way to warn Monty or anyone else here. Find Yaz and Ryan and tell them… something.

She could just go.

But… she didn’t want to.

Hesitantly, she turned to fully face him. He looked just as uncertain: about how they felt, about what they should do now— 

About who they were.

“Come back to bed,” Harry whispered. 

With a smile and a sigh, Jenny agreed.

* * *

While Ryan gave Kayla a general rundown of who the Doctor was, who the Master was, who _they_ were, and what brought them all to an alumni reunion at her house, Yaz did her best to think about anything _other_ than the horrible things she had overheard from that bedroom.

She more or less managed it: the question that now occupied the topmost part of Yaz’s thoughts wasn’t _why_ this happened (because of course it was obvious in hindsight how the Doctor seemed to shy away from the touch of everyone but him, and it was impossible to forget how near they stood to one another after the Master revealed his true identity), or _how_ this happened (because that was also obvious, given the Doctor’s recklessness and occasionally poor judgement), but _when_ this happened.

The Doctor had been genuinely shocked to discover that O was not who she thought he was, so it must have begun after that point—but whatever _this_ was could have started as far back as when the Doctor was flung through time to the early 19th century without the TARDIS. The Master followed her there—for all anyone knew, they might have taken the first opportunity they had to be alone and… 

_Don’t think about that._

Of course, that didn’t stop either of them from trying to chuck the other into the Kasaavin’s dimension, but the Doctor had known that he would survive and escape—so certain, in fact, that she had been secretly trying to locate the Master ever since.

But the most likely answer was that it all started when the Master took her across the Boundary, and during that unknown amount of time things had progressed to the point of _this._

Yaz had suspected that the Doctor was gone for a much longer stretch of time than she claimed, because she seemed to have forgotten details from the things that had happened shortly before then, like their encounter with Lord Byron and Mary and Percy Shelley. 

And then there was that awful incident on Rhyd IV where Yaz, Ryan, and Graham had all been injured (in Graham’s case, rather severely) and all the Doctor did was drop them off at a hospital without a word. She’d apologised later, genuinely mortified by what she’d done—even if it hadn’t been her fault that they got hurt—so after they started travelling again, Yaz attributed the Doctor’s increasingly odd behaviour to the aftermath of that disaster. Not the most forthcoming of people to begin with, she had grown even more secretive than before: constantly checking her phone, finding excuses to, in her words, “pop off for a quick check on something,” and then returning even more distracted than before.

_Why did it take us so long to figure this out?_

The Doctor was right about one thing, Yaz thought grimly: they _were_ idiots.

Which meant that this was probably the end of their time travelling with the Doctor. Tonight would be one last adventure, one final mystery to solve, and then she and Ryan would go back to Sheffield and the Doctor would move on with the person she’d apparently been longing for all this time.

But in the meantime, Yaz needed to focus on the current problem. She checked her phone again: “It’s 10:22,” she said. “Four minutes since we last checked.”

“We’ve been talking for longer than that,” Kayla said nervously.

“Maybe the mobile networks are malfunctioning,” Ryan suggested.

“Hang on, I’ve got a regular watch around here somewhere.” Kayla rummaged through the drawers on her bedside table. “Here it is—oh. Yeah, it says 10:22. Not the mobile networks, then.”

“Whatever’s happening,” Yaz said, “it has something to do with the Master and your father. He’s had ages to plan it—not your dad,” she reassured Kayla, then frowned. “Unless you think he’d do something like that—”

“Of course not,” Kayla replied with a snort of laughter. “Dad’s not a planner. Hmm…” She paced around the room. “Oh! I heard him say this morning that he was worried about the caterers leaving on time, because he wanted the parking area in the back clear.”

“Like he’s expecting someone?”

She shook her head. “No, they’d park where the guests usually park. He uses the back for unloading deliveries.”

“So not someone,” Yaz said, “some _thing._ But what would he want delivered in the middle of the night?”

“Not sure. He hasn’t mentioned it. But it was probably Harry’s—sorry, the Master’s idea.” She shivered. “So creepy.”

“Then let’s go find your father,” Ryan said. “If we can catch him without the Master around, there might still be a way to stop this.”

“Except that, at nearly-half-past-ten, he was still at the reunion party—oh!” Kayla’s eyes lit up with excitement. “Dad was expecting me to make an appearance. I could go down, get him to talk to me alone, and then the two of you can explain to him what’s going on. Here, give me your phone, Yaz—” She tapped the screen a few times, posed for a selfie, and then tapped a few more times until her own mobile chimed. “There we are,” Kayla finally said, satisfied. She aimed her phone’s camera at Yaz. “Say cheese.” 

Yaz did her best to smile. 

Kayla either didn’t notice or didn’t mind. “I’ll text you when I’ve got Dad by himself.”

When she handed it back, Yaz discovered that Kayla had sent herself a text from Yaz’s phone: an emoji of a winking face blowing a kiss.

“Do you think he’ll believe us?” Ryan asked Kayla.

She grinned. “Only one way to find out. Let’s go.”

Yaz got to the door first. She opened it and— 

“Chop them _again,”_ Lucas said, annoyed, pointing back to the spot in the prep kitchen where Yaz had just spent the last eternity cutting up onions.

“What?” Yaz asked. How had she gotten _here?_ She could faintly see daylight coming in through the back door, but she was just— 

“Yaz, what’s going on?” Ryan asked. He looked just as confused as she felt. 

“What’s going _on,”_ said Lucas, “is that you’re both rubbish enough with knives that it’s a wonder you haven’t bled to death. Now _go!”_

“Forget all that,” Yaz snapped. “We have more important things to do.” She grabbed Ryan by the sleeve and headed for the back door.

Outside, two women were complaining about the person who Yaz now knew was the Master:

“…is it true that Jones drove that old Scottish lecturer into retirement?” the blonde one inquired.

 _Scottish lecturer…_ Ryan and Yaz exchanged a glance. “That couldn’t be…” he whispered, bewildered.

“No wonder she was able to send her past self to pick us up,” Yaz whispered back. “They were there at the same time.”

“The two of them together,” the redhead replied bitterly. “They said he’d been there for over fifty years—though I don’t think he was _that_ old—but all it took was one year with Smith and Jones for him to throw in the towel. Vanished without a trace in the middle of the night.”

 _One year?_ Yaz felt sick to her stomach again. How long were the Doctor and the Master… together… after the incident at the Boundary?

The blonde turned to look at Yaz and Ryan. “Are you looking for something?” she asked, irritated.

“No,” Ryan said, “just taking a walk.” He and Yaz hurried past them and towards the door they had entered with Kayla previously… or possibly subsequently… or— 

“Hold on,” Yaz said, looking back over her shoulder, “we were outside with them before, listening to their conversation, but our past selves aren’t there.”

“And we were out there before those two women were,” he added, “but inside, we still hadn’t gone on break yet.”

“Temporal anomaly,” they both said at the same time. 

“Come on,” Yaz said, “we need to get back inside before someone sees us.”

They had only gone another few steps when Ryan stumbled and nearly fell over.

“What’s wrong?” Yaz asked.

“Headache,” he said through gritted teeth. “I’ve been having them all evening.” He inhaled sharply with a grimace of pain. “They’re getting worse… and weirder.”

“Weirder how?”

“Seeing things: halos around people, blinding lights… starting to hear things too.”

Yaz took his arm. “Can you walk?”

“I think so. It’ll wear off in a moment.”

They hurried for the door to the sunroom. To her relief, the door was unlocked, so—

She was in one of the rooms upstairs—the ladies’ sitting room, if she remembered Kayla’s tour correctly—curled up on a sofa with her head resting on Ryan’s shoulder. 

Yaz was speaking, though she didn’t know why she was saying what she was saying: it was like her mouth was moving on its own, or like she was eavesdropping on herself.

“I can’t believe she’s gone,” she said, feeling her voice choked with tears.

“You don’t know for sure.” Ryan was obviously trying to be reassuring, but Yaz could hear the doubt in his words. “All we know is that she disappeared.”

“But you saw what happened…” She began shivering and she felt Ryan’s arm tighten around her. “How did _we_ survive?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know…”

He trailed off, and the two of them huddled together, as though one of them would vanish if they let go.

Yaz blinked, and they were both back in the hallway outside Kayla’s room.

“What just happened?” Ryan asked, bewildered.

Yaz touched her face, which only a moment ago was wet with tears… but it was dry now.

“We jumped through time,” she said. “Back to earlier this afternoon… and then forward into the future.”

“We know for sure now,” Ryan said grimly. “The Doctor is definitely in danger.”

* * *

“Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” the Master said directly into her ear. 

“I wasn’t asleep,” the Doctor said irritably. Though she _was_ technically elsewhere while Jenny took over, for most of the time since that last clue the Doctor had kept her mind busy with trying to figure out exactly what awful surprise the Master had in store for her.

Given the timeframe he’d mentioned—fifteen years ago—it must have something to do with the Archangel, she concluded. The temporal paradox the Master had caused during that incident was massive, and if he had been visiting Monty for the last two years, it would have been a similar amount of time for him to set it up—more than last time, in fact, since he’d only had eighteen months as Harold Saxon. 

He said that it was an item—another paradox machine? Or even just some of the communications equipment from the Archangel Network… except that he said it wasn’t from Earth. Something from the Toclafane, maybe? But that wouldn’t explain the temporal anomaly… 

And how— _how—_ could any of this be a solution to a problem that _she_ had? More often than not, whatever made the Master happy tended to make the Doctor extremely upset, and historically, his assessment of what qualified as _“helpful”_ tended to involve things like armies of Cybermen.

 _Please_ _don’t let it be the Cybermen. I’ve had more than enough of them._

He waited until she was fully dressed, including her coat, and then led her out of the room and down the stairs.

Unlike earlier, when it was full of people and noise, the house was eerily silent. “Does Monty have security people?” the Doctor asked. 

“Yes,” the Master replied, “but they know me, obviously.” His smile widened. “Plus, the schedule for their rounds tonight has been rather carefully altered.”

“Of course it has,” she sighed. “Where are we going?”

He looked annoyed. “You’re really ruining the whole vibe of ‘breathless anticipation,’ you know.”

She couldn’t help smirking. “Well, you know me: I’m very good at ruining your day.”

“My one consolation is that once you _do_ know what the surprise is, you’re going to feel extremely silly for being so grumpy right now.”

“Cut to the chase, then,” she taunted him. “Let me get a head start on feeling silly.”

“No time now: we’re here.” He pushed open the door to the study at the rear of the house, where Monty was examining what looked like a safety deposit box.

The man looked up from the desk as they entered. “Harry, is that you?”

“Hello, Monty, dear,” the Master replied cheerfully. 

“Is that Jenny as well?”

“Who else would I be wandering around with in the middle of the night?” the Master said, pretending to be scandalised. While the two men laughed, he wrapped an arm around the Doctor’s waist. “She got a bit peckish so I thought we’d go raid the fridge—and then I heard the noise from in here.” He indicated the box with his free hand. “Is that the latest addition to your collection?”

Monty’s expression was a little sheepish. “It would be if I could put in the combination correctly. I left my reading glasses upstairs.”

“Ah, no need to go to all that trouble,” the Master reassured him. “I’ve got just the thing.”

He brought up the arm that had been around the Doctor’s waist and pointed her sonic screwdriver at it.

“What are you _doing?”_ the Doctor hissed.

“Only basic property crime,” he scoffed as the metal box popped open. 

Monty looked more puzzled than alarmed. “Well, that’s a handy trick,” he said. “Where did you get something like that?”

The Doctor tried to snatch the screwdriver back from him, but the Master dodged her initial attempt. “Oh, my wife just _loves_ her little toys,” he remarked, twirling the item between his fingers. 

“Monty, whatever he’s told you—” the Doctor started to say, but was interrupted.

“Not to worry, dearest, I’ve only told him lovely things about you.” He joined Monty by the desk.

“He’s here to rob you!” she finally shouted.

Monty tilted his head to the side quizzically. _“Rob_ me?” The Doctor inwardly cursed the Master’s ability to make people trust him so thoroughly that it was impossible to convince them that he had something other than their best interests at heart. “A bit Agatha Christie, isn’t it?” he laughed. “Country houses and jewel thieves?”

The Master joined in the laughter. “A bit, yes.”

The Doctor blinked. _Jewel thieves?_

The first hints of doubt appeared in Monty’s expression. “Sorry, what?”

The Master continued laughing, but it was much less congenial than before. “You were so _eager_ to take my advice, _old chum._ Invest in whatever industries I suggested, host tonight’s little gathering… and start a lovely private collection of rare minerals, culminating in the acquisition of _this_ wonderful item.” He winked and grabbed the box. “Present for the missus, you know how it is.”

“Excuse me?” Monty sputtered indignantly. “Harry, what’s all this abo—”

“Oh, switch off, Monty,” the Master said, snapping his fingers. 

Monty’s eyes rolled into the back of his head and he slumped to the floor.

“Is he—?” the Doctor asked, horrified.

“Come on, Doctor, you know he’s just unconscious,” the Master replied with a snort. “A little hypnotic suggestion—I could do it in my sleep. So could you, for that matter.” He tucked the box under his arm. “Let’s go to the greenhouse: I stashed a few useful items in there.”

“No,” she said, blocking his route to the door. “No, whatever you’re doing, we’re going to settle it right here.”

“With Monty drooling on the carpet? Where’s your sense of aesthetics, Doctor?” He stepped past her. “If you want to tackle me to the ground and pry the thing out of my hands, feel free,” he called over his shoulder, “but we both know that you won’t.”

The Doctor’s sole consolation, as she followed him down the hall with a scowl on her face, was that she really had considered flinging herself at him and biting his hand until he dropped the box, but _chose_ not to (though it was because recently, most of her _“flinging”_ —and, admittedly, _“biting”_ —had involved Jenny and Harry and a lot of bad decisions).

Once she caught up with the Master at the door from the main house into the greenhouse, she noticed that his expression was a bit annoyed. “Incidentally,” he said, “I will never understand why you keep pretending to be as psychically limited as these human flies. Why use that ‘psychic paper’ nonsense when you could just compel them directly? It’s not like you aren’t capable of doing it.”

 _Of all the things to complain about—_ “Are we really going to argue about this right now?” she demanded. 

“No, we’re not,” he admitted, opening the door and ushering her inside, “but it’s still relevant to what I’m about to show you.”

At night, the greenhouse had an eeriness to it that it had lacked during their daytime visit with Monty. With the interior lights out, the only illumination came from the fixtures on the rear of the main house. 

If he was bringing up psychic abilities, then— “So it _is_ related to the Archangel Network,” she muttered.

“Excuse me?” Unexpectedly, he looked surprised. 

“You said it was an item from our past—”

“Not _that_ incident!” He frowned. “Oh, I suppose I did have my numbers a bit off, didn’t I? Closer to ten years ago than fifteen.” He shrugged and set the box down on a workbench. “Ah well, we all make mistakes.” 

“Even Time Lords?” she couldn’t help needling him, even though her mind was busy trying to figure out what incident he _was_ referring to.

 _“Especially_ Time Lords.” He pulled a paper bag out from underneath the workbench that contained what looked like wires and a few bits of circuitry. “I prepared this all beforehand; just have to pop the last parts in and give them a quick weld—your little screwdriver can manage _that,_ at least.”

_Not the Archangel. If it wasn’t the Archangel… if it was an incident that happened more recently, then—_

Her eyes widened.

_Jewel thieves. Psychic abilities._

“Do you remember now, Doctor?” the Master asked, removing the box’s contents—contents that the Doctor now knew very well. “The time a star fell from the sky?”

“I destroyed it,” she insisted.

“You were a very good shot, I’ll give you that.” His attention was mostly on what he was assembling using her screwdriver. “But all you had was a primitive Earth weapon, so you just broke it in half. Obviously, it was enough to destroy the Immortality Gate and send Rassilon and the rest of the War back where they belonged—you’re welcome for the assist, by the way—”

“Whatever you’re doing,” the Doctor pleaded with him, “it’s not worth it—”

 _“Stop trying to guess what I’m planning!”_ he shouted, slamming the sonic screwdriver down onto the workbench. “All right? It’s not a plot to make a planet full of clones, or reopen the lock around the Time War, or even cause a small localised snow shower! It’s just _this!”_

He held out a small gold chain long enough to hang around her neck, with filigreed wire keeping in place one half of an item that the Doctor had hoped never to see again: a diamond found only on Gallifrey.

The White-Point Star.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Both the White-Point Star and the incident with Immortality Gate (aka "The Yeet of Rassilon") are from the two-part episode "The End of Time," which was the finale of the Tenth Doctor's era.


	5. If You Want a Doctor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Remember when I said back at the beginning that this story was going to get weird? This is the chapter.

To some extent, it was laughable. Utterly laughable. 

She decided to treat it as such: “You went to all of this trouble,” the Doctor said incredulously. “You manipulated Monty, infiltrated an alumni committee, threw a _reunion_ for St Luke’s University, dragged me around with you the entire evening, stole _several_ items—including my sonic screwdriver, by the way—”

“Are we really going to argue about your _screwdriver_ right now?” the Master said, echoing her words from earlier.

“—and all of it was so you could give me a necklace with the power to _rip open a hole_ in the fabric of space and time?”

“Just take it,” he insisted.

“What ridiculous problem do you think you’re solving here? A lack of accessories?”

His eyes flashed with genuine anger. “Ever since that year we spent together,” he snapped, “neither of us have been able to move on with our lives. Those two _humans_ are in the back of our minds, interfering and impairing our judgement with their constant _longing_ for one another, and they won’t give us a moment’s peace until they’re back together. So this—” he indicated the necklace, “—will ensure that they are.”

_“What?”_

He held up a matching necklace of his own. “The White-Point Star, as you just noted, was powerful enough that it was able to form a psychic link between Earth and a war that had been sealed away beyond even Rassilon’s ability to escape. And now, split in half, the two pieces are entangled on a quantum level. We could be anywhere in space and time—you running around at the dawn of the universe while I kick back at the end of it—and the two halves would still be linked because they are functionally _the same.”_

She gaped at him. “You’re in my head enough as it is.”

“That’s what this would _avoid:_ Harry and Jenny could stay connected through these, and we could leave each other alone.”

“That won’t work!” she protested.

“Yes, it will!” he cried. “I’ve spent ages looking for a solution and this is _perfect.”_

“They would be talking constantly! The voices would drive us both mad!”

The Master smirked. “Madness isn’t so bad once you get used to it.”

“Not like this,” she countered. “It would be like regenerative dissonance: there would be two personas active at the same time—you remember the Eleven, don’t you?”

“Ugh, _that_ twisted mess.” He grimaced at the memory of the renegade Time Lord before returning to the subject at hand. “But it _won’t_ be the same. They’ll just be in the background— _they’ll_ be connected, not us.” The Master walked closer to her and held out the necklace again. “Trust me.”

The Doctor recoiled, almost knocking over a potted plant that had been hiding in the shadows. “Absolutely not.” 

His features twisted in disgust. “Do you want to know what I think, Doctor?” he sneered. “I think you’re only objecting to it because you might actually be _pleased_ with the results and you couldn’t bear being _happy_ for more than a few minutes before finding some new tragedy to get wrapped up in.” The corners of his mouth twitched into the hint of a smile. “Or is it because you secretly want an excuse to see me again?”

Her jaw dropped. “You’re the one who did all of this and you’re accusing _me_ of being attached?”

“I won’t be your dirty little secret anymore, will I? One less complication in your life.” His expression curdled. “You’ve never wanted anything to do with me,” he said bitterly. “I’ve done all sorts of things to get your attention and you’ve made it rather plain that it would suit you just fine if I launched myself into the nearest black hole.”

“That isn’t true,” the Doctor protested. “I’ve told you before: if you would just stop—”

“If I would stop what?” he shot back. “Being broken?”

“No: trying to break everything _else!”_ It always came back to this, somehow: the Master blaming others for his actions instead of deciding to just not _do_ those things anymore. “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to stand with me—”

“Oh, you’ve said that,” he said derisively. “But it’s easy to say those things when you know I’d never take you up on it. It’s easy to _sound_ self-righteous when you know you’ll never have to back it up with action.” 

Abruptly, his anger deflated and he looked surprisingly vulnerable. “I asked you to come back with me, to be Jenny and Harry again for good, and you said no every time. I figured that this way, you would have an excuse to avoid the question once and for all.” His shoulders slumped in defeat. “And then I could stop… hoping,” he added quietly.

The Doctor felt her hearts ache. She knew that the year they were at St Luke’s had more of an impact on him than on her—or at least made him more miserable— 

_“Five hundred sixty-two days, eighteen hours, and forty-three minutes,”_ he had told her earlier.

“Listen,” she said softly, reaching out, “just because I said that—”

That gesture was enough to put her back within range: the Master lunged forward and slipped the necklace around her neck.

“Got you,” he said with a smirk that didn’t quite meet his eyes. He put his own necklace on. “Now you’ll see what I mean. It’ll—”

He gasped and his eyes went wide. The Doctor felt herself doing the same.

At the exact same moment.

“It’s linking _us,”_ she managed to say, though her thoughts were whirling in circles and she kept having flashes of memories that felt like her own but didn’t _look_ like her own. 

“Just give it a minute,” the Master forced out through gritted teeth. “It needs time to adjust—I tuned it to connect to _them,_ it should work!”

The Doctor wanted to point out all the times that the Master’s supposed _“fool-proof plans”_ were utter catastrophes even without her interference, but it wouldn’t change the real reason for this latest miscalculation.

She just didn’t want to admit it out loud.

She tried to take the necklace off, but the Master grabbed her by the wrist before she could manage it.

The air around them filled with a flash of light and sound, like a lightning bolt coursing between them. 

“Let go!” she gasped.

“Can’t,” the Master replied. He sounded like he was in as much pain as she was. “My fingers won’t move.” His face contorted in frustration. “Why is this happening?”

“Blinovitch Limitation Effect,” the Doctor said. “If the two halves of the White-Point Star are quantum-entangled, then when we touched it had the same effect of two of the same people touching—” 

“Yes, I know what the BLE is!” he snapped. “But I adjusted for that: Harry and Jenny aren’t controlling our bodies right now, so our touching shouldn’t have triggered it. This shouldn’t have happened! Why didn’t it work?”

_Because we’re idiots._

There was no point in keeping it to herself anymore: “Because we were lying to ourselves.” The energy engulfing both of them was agony, but the truth felt so much worse. “It was easier to think of them as separate people, easier to compartmentalise what they were doing from what we were doing, easier to blame them for our poor judgement, but—”

“No,” the Master insisted. “They _are_ separate, they _are—”_

“No, they’re not!” the Doctor shouted. “A mental construct, maybe, but still ours! For once in our lives, let’s be honest: they’re not separate people, they’re _us!”_ She drew in a shaky breath, and winced at the sound of him doing the same. “We tacitly agreed to think of it that way because the alternative was…”

His grip on her wrist tightened. “That every time he longed for her…” he said slowly, “every time they were together… every time they said that they…”

“That they loved each other,” the Doctor finished, though she could hear him speaking the words along with her as the boundary between them began to blur even more. “Every time, that was us.”

It was naive of her, but the Doctor had hoped that by admitting the truth, the light and sound and writhing energy would stop, but it didn’t. At this point, they had staggered against one another, keeping themselves upright only through the most precarious attempt at balancing.

Even the slightest touch between two versions of the same person was enough to cause localised damage to the fabric of time. This extended contact risked much worse things—things with wings and claws and fathomless hunger, and she could sense their arrival— 

_She? Wait, no, I wasn’t—but I am—but no, focus! What is happening to us? Or me? How many are we?_

The boundary between the Doctor and the Master had done more than blur: it had vanished entirely, pulling them even closer together, past the point of _same_ and into the realm of _one._

The White-Point Star wanted to be whole again.

Which meant bringing its two halves back together.

The waves of energy had engulfed the entire room, running up and down the walls and across the ceiling and floor, forming cracks in the air itself, through which red-eyed gargoyles crept through… and in the eye of the storm stood a single figure, flickering back and forth between two different sets of features like a pair of transmissions broadcast on the same channel.

Even its voice struggled to find an equilibrium as it spoke:

_“The temporal anomaly… is me.”_

* * *

When she joined them in the hallway, Kayla looked just as shaken as Yaz and Ryan felt. “I blinked,” she said, “and then I was downstairs trying to find an ice bucket for the champagne.” She gestured behind her at the bucket on a table inside her room, which was full of water from the melted ice. “Then I was down in Dad’s study and all the lights were out.” She raised an eyebrow. “Temporal anomaly?”

Ryan nodded. “Temporal anomaly. We did the same thing: flashed back to earlier in the day and then forward in time.” He exchanged a glance with Yaz. “Whatever’s going to happen tonight, it’s not good.”

“Still 10:22,” Yaz noted, looking at her phone. “Kayla, you need to find your father. We need to find the Doctor—and in both cases, keep them away from the Master.”

“We lost the element of surprise,” Ryan noted with a grimace, “so I guess we don’t have to worry about him finding out that we’re here.” He sighed. “I’ll try and distract him while you get the Doctor—”

 _“I’ll_ distract him,” Yaz said, obviously more sharply than she intended, because she took a shaky breath before continuing. “I’m not sure I can face her right now, not after what we heard.”

“Even knowing that the Doctor might—” he countered, but kept himself from saying the last word outright: _die._

_She might die tonight._

“Not if we stop him,” Yaz said firmly. “And we _will_ stop him.”

“Of course we will!” Kayla chimed in. When Yaz and Ryan turned to look at her, the girl smiled sheepishly. “Sorry, got caught up in the excitement. It’s been a really boring summer. Should I grab the champagne bottle in case we need to hit him over the head?”

Ryan shrugged. “Couldn’t hurt.”

“Oh, trust me,” she said, pulling the bottle out of the ice bucket and taking a swig before joining them back in the hallway, “it’ll _definitely_ hurt.” She grinned at Yaz who, to Ryan’s amusement, looked a little bit flustered in response.

 _And meanwhile I had to wash pots and pans all night,_ he tried not to grumble out loud as they made their way down the stairs.

“I see Dad’s table,” Kayla said as they neared the main doors to the ballroom. “I’ll go around the back way and get his attention from there.” She vanished through a nearby door to what Ryan realized was the same hallway he had used when setting up the desserts.

Before he could decide whether or not to follow her, he heard Yaz say, “It’s the same as before.” It took Ryan a moment to understand the reason for the dread in her voice: the Master was standing on a chair at the far end of the room and making a speech.

As he scanned the room, Ryan couldn’t see the Doctor, though he assumed that she was probably nearby.

_Would have been easier if she was a little taller._

_Or if she was as shouty and rude as she normally is._

“…but for some of us,” the Master proclaimed, grinning at his audience, “our time at St Luke’s gave us something even more special: the relationships we formed while we were there. Friendships… maybe a few nemeses…” The audience chuckled.

It was a bit like seeing O again, Ryan thought to himself uneasily: just an average human, slightly nerdy, excitable and shy. 

“And speaking of nemeses…” The Master made a sweeping gesture with the hand not holding the microphone. “Everyone give a big round of applause for Yasmin Khan and Ryan Sinclair!”

Everything lit up as though a spotlight was shining directly in their faces. Ryan winced and held up a hand to shield his eyes.

He lowered it again a moment later at the sound of a familiar voice: “Excuse me,” the Master said icily; he had somehow crossed the ballroom in an instant and was now face to face with them in the doorway. “No gate-crashers allowed,” he hissed.

The doors to the ballroom slammed shut with a bang.

The sound, combined with the discomfort of the lights a moment ago, combined to send another spike of agony through Ryan’s skull. 

_You’ve got something around your—_

But it faded away as quickly as it arrived, and when Ryan turned to find her, he realised that Yaz was gone.

* * *

Their eyes opened.

_Who am I?_

_Oh, I’m new! Brand new person. Ooo, that’s interesting._

They examined their hands, still flickering back and forth between two different sizes, shapes, and complexions.

_Hmm… guess that bit’s still getting sorted. It’ll settle down eventually, I can feel it._

_I can feel! Oh, that’s brilliant! How_ _do_ _I feel? Pretty wonderful, actually. I’m me, and I_ _love_ _being me. Does that normally happen to people? Do they wake up and feel ecstatic just because they exist?_

_Doesn’t matter: I know I’m not normal. I’m better than normal. Extraordinary. Unprecedented._

They looked down at their necklace: two shards now fused back into a single diamond.

 _My two halves were impossible enough and now I’m_ _two_ _geniuses rolled up in one. Creator and Destroyer of the Time Lords. The universe’s most beloved hero and most reviled villain. Traveller and tormentor. I’m all of these things, which means that I can be anything._

_So who am I?_

_The name doesn’t matter yet. I’ll know it once I know who I am. I can feel it on my teeth and my tongue, waiting for my lips to speak it out loud._

_It will be a wonderful name. I can’t wait._

It was only then that they looked around at their surroundings: at the jagged lines of light writhing on the walls and the gargoyle-like figures crawling and flying around the greenhouse.

 _Oh. Well, that’s not good, is it? Wait,_ _is_ _it? I can feel little rips in time all around me. It doesn’t usually do that. Should I fix it?_

 _Can_ _I fix it? It’s a temporal paradox, which explains all the Reapers flying around, taking advantage of the wound in time to consume everything around them. Not just that: the cracks are widening. If this keeps up, it’ll probably destroy everything here._

 _But_ _I’m_ _the temporal paradox. Does that mean that I have to—_

They flinched back from that thought with a cry.

_No! I don’t want to go. I love being me, I’m so new, I want to live! My two halves wanted me to exist—they couldn’t bear to be without one another, so here I am!_

_And I’m so much better than they ever were. I deserve to live._

_But what do I do now? What do I do about all this damage?_

_I could run. I’d be fantastic at running. I could run anywhere._

_But if I’m the paradox, then the tears in time and the Reapers and everything else will follow me no matter where I go._

_Speaking of Reapers… there are quite a lot of them trapped in here, I see. Fortunately, this is an old house with an equally-old greenhouse—and the older a structure is, the stronger it is against the Reapers—but it won’t hold them forever. They’ll find a way to break through eventually._

_If I release them, though, they’ll spread out and leave me alone._

They lifted a hand (still flickering, but not as much as before) in the direction of the walls of the greenhouse. They could hear the glass rattle in the panes, easy to shatter with a little more psychic force… which they possessed in abundance.

_I can crack this little glass prison open like an eggshell._

Every wall exploded outwards, sending glass shards out into the night—followed by a multitude of Reapers flying up and away.

_Not bad for my first day of existence._

They smiled, but only for a moment.

_Oh… there are people nearby, aren’t there? Forgot about that._

_Should I have protected them? Risked my life instead?_

_Oh dear. That’s one of those Tricky Questions I’m going to have to answer before I figure out who I am._

They paused and tried to work out an answer, but were interrupted by the leathery flap of wings.

Not all of the Reapers had flown away… and the ones who remained were circling them with hungry red eyes.

* * *

The sound of the slamming doors made Yaz flinch back instinctively (though she might have done that anyway because _how_ had the Master teleported across the room like that?), so she didn’t notice right away that she was no longer where she had been a moment ago. 

It was another ballroom, that was obvious, though it was almost entirely empty with the exception of a few musicians playing in the corner and a handful of couples dancing to the music. 

And one of the couples— 

“Get away from her!” Yaz shouted, heading directly for them and realising that she didn’t have a plan for when she got within range other than to maybe try to claw the Master’s eyes out of his head.

“Ooo, somebody wants to cut in,” the Master taunted. They were still dancing—waltzing, it looked like—and he altered their steps slightly to put himself in between Yaz and the Doctor. 

“Are you upset, Yaz?” the Doctor inquired over the Master’s shoulder. “Because you really look upset right now.”

“Of course I’m upset!” Yaz snapped. “He tried to murder us and you’re…” She tried not to sputter… or start crying again. “How long have you been doing this?”

“Since always,” the Master piped up. “Since we locked eyes our first day at the Academy. Since we promised to see every star together.”

“Since that day at the Boundary,” the Doctor explained. Yaz couldn’t tell if it was guilt she saw in the Doctor’s eyes or not.

“Well, whatever this little _hookup_ is supposed to be,” Yaz told her bitterly, “you’re in danger. We all are, but especially you.” 

The lights in the room flickered and the music similarly skipped like a scratched record. 

“Tossed around in time, were you?” the Master asked with a derisive snort. “Got a glimpse of the future?”

“Yes—”

But the Doctor interrupted her. “Spoilers,” she scolded Yaz. “Besides, aren’t I always telling you that the future isn’t fixed?”

She didn’t even seem to _care,_ and it was that lack of concern that made Yaz lose her temper. “Will you stop messing around and just _listen_ to me?” She grabbed the Doctor’s arm and pulled— 

—and then found herself dancing with the Doctor as Yaz’s feet moved in time to the music without her controlling them.

“What do you want me to say?” the Doctor asked, placing one hand in Yaz’s right hand and the other on Yaz’s waist. “The temporal paradox is already happening. Already happened. Already will have happened.”

“But it’s not like you’d understand it anyway,” the Master said, and suddenly he had replaced the Doctor as Yaz’s dance partner. “Just nod your head like a good little human. It tends to be easier for everyone.”

The lights flickered again—Yaz noticed that they were growing dimmer with each disruption—and the Doctor was back. “You should be on your way, Yaz. There’s nothing you can do here.”

Even though she was still furious at the Doctor for lying to her—for lying to all of them—she still couldn’t help saying, “If you think I’m going to leave here without you—”

The Master’s laughter drowned out her words. “Oh look, Doctor, she thinks she’s one of the _special_ ones!” He lifted an arm and twirled Yaz around. “Do you really think you’re the first humans she’s ever travelled with?”

When she spun back, she was facing the Doctor again. “The first ones I’ve ever called _brilliant_ and _important_ and _fantastic?”_ the Doctor asked, over-enunciating every word.

Every time one of them spoke, they replaced the other as the one Yaz was dancing with. She couldn’t tell where the other one went when they weren’t speaking, especially because the rest of the room had grown so dark that Yaz couldn’t see anything outside of the spotlight that followed them.

The Master laughed. “There have been dozens—”

“—more like hundreds,” the Doctor interjected.

“—of you humans, and the best-case outcome is that they get left behind somewhere, either at their request—”

“—or because I couldn’t be bothered to take them home again.”

“A lot of them don’t even make it that far.” The Master twirled her again, and Yaz struggled to stay on her feet. “So many little human lives, snuffed out like candles.”

The music groaned, like metal straining under a heavy weight. The dance began to speed up, each turn growing faster and faster… 

The Doctor looked at Yaz wistfully. “But you all do that: live for such fleeting moments and then vanish…”

“…and then she finds another one,” the Master finished with a shrug. “What’s that term you humans use to describe it?”

 _“ Memento mori,”_ the Doctor supplied. She placed a hand on Yaz’s cheek. “You’re so brief and so beautiful because of it…” Yaz flinched back but couldn’t escape. “…but everything ends.”

“Except us, of course.” The Master pretended to look surprised. “Oh… you didn’t know that bit, did you?”

The smirk on the Doctor’s face wasn’t her own, but the one Yaz once saw the Master wear when he trapped them on a doomed airplane. “I never told you,” the Doctor said. “Because why would I?”

“She’s millions of years old,” the Master whispered in Yaz’s ear, like he was imparting some kind of secret. “Maybe even billions.”

Now it was the Doctor’s whisper in her ear: “I’ll just keep regenerating, over and over.”

The Master’s hand on Yaz’s waist trembled slightly. “I was so angry when I found out.”

Yaz tried to get away, but she was still trapped in this nightmarish waltz to music that was no longer music but the scrape of stone on metal under the Doctor’s words: “But now we’re together—really together, _finally—”_

“So we can share that,” the Master giggled.

Not only was the dance getting faster, the two Time Lords were alternating more quickly now, almost with every step, to the point where Yaz was becoming less and less certain who she was talking to at any given moment. “Finally, no more fighting,” the Doctor (maybe) said.

“Just us.”

“Forever.”

“Extraordinary.”

“Unprecedented.”

“So tragic for you, though,” the Master sighed.

“Sorry to see you go.” The Doctor’s sigh was an unsettling echo of his. “But it’s over.”

The Master spun Yaz around one more time, nearly lifting her off of her feet. “We’re the only companion we’ll ever need,” he said, and released her.

As Yaz staggered backwards, she heard a scream.

“Ooo,” one of them breathed in quiet delight—Yaz couldn’t tell if it was the Doctor or the Master. “Somebody’s in trouble now, aren’t they?”

The spotlight winked out, plunging the room into darkness. 

* * *

There was another stab of pain in his head, and when Ryan opened his eyes again, he found himself in the upstairs hallway outside one of the bedrooms.

On the other side of the door, he could hear the Doctor: “I know you’re trying to figure out how to stop this,” she said quietly. “I can see it in your eyes. But there’s nothing you can do, so don’t bother.” After a slight pause, she added, “When is the delivery arriving?”

Strangely, she then answered her own question: “Midnight. Nothing to do but wait.”

She was definitely in there, and might have been the only one there since no one else was speaking. Ryan burst through the door, half-expecting to be shifted in time again, but instead he nearly crashed into the Master, who was just inside the room. Behind him, the Doctor was sitting on the bed, regarding Ryan with an amused expression.

“I thought I said _‘no gate-crashers,’”_ the Master snarled. 

“Doctor!” Ryan said, trying to get around him. “The anomaly’s started! Come on, we’ve got to go!”

“Don’t worry your pretty little head about that,” she said, then waved her hand in dismissal. “In fact, you can run along home now.”

It didn’t sound like something the Doctor would say.

“There’s nothing you can do,” the Master taunted, still blocking his way. “But there never is, is there? You’re just there to pull focus until the Doctor can sort everything out as usual. A distraction, that’s all.”

“Oh, come on,” the Doctor chided as she got to her feet, “sometimes they’re very useful distractions. You of all people should know the power of misdirection in pulling off a good trick.”

They both kept their eyes on Ryan. “Maybe if you wait around, twiddling your thumbs,” the Master hissed, “things will all work out in the end… but do you really want to chance it?”

“Whatever you're doing to her—” Ryan began, but then shifted his attention back to the Doctor. “Can I talk to you alone for a minute?”

“Oh Ryan,” the Doctor said with a laugh very unlike her own, “of course not.” She stood behind the Master and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Where I go, he goes now.”

To say that the Master looked smug was a massive understatement, but so did the Doctor. In fact, their expressions were so similar that Ryan was reminded of the Doctor’s explanation of the Uncanny Valley earlier in the day.

He shivered.

“Stop this,” was all he could think of to say.

“Why would it ever stop?” the Master asked. “This is only the beginning.”

There was a skittering sound from the other side of the wall.

“Ooo,” breathed the Doctor with a giggle. “Better get a shift on, Ryan. I don’t think you want to be here for what happens next.”

She giggled again—they both did, actually—and Ryan found himself backing away and out of the room, fear making his feet move of their own volition.

He watched the Doctor lean forward to whisper in the Master’s ear and Ryan saw her mouth form the words: _you’ve got something around your—_

And then the door slammed in his face, cutting off the final word.

* * *

She couldn’t stop shaking. 

There had been so many emergencies, so many dangerous things out there, so many perils and threats to the Earth or countless other planets… and Yaz had faced them all without backing down, without giving in to despair, without breaking, because she knew that somehow, somewhere, even if she wasn’t right there with Yaz, the Doctor would find a way to put everything right again.

The Doctor would always be on their side.

Yaz hadn’t considered there would ever come a time when the Doctor _wasn’t_ on their side, that she would be anything other than the steel in their spines, the hope in their chests, the hero of a story that Yaz still couldn’t believe her luck at getting to take part in.

Only now…

Yaz remembered her own words from earlier, the ones from her future self: _“I can’t believe she’s gone.”_

Is that what she meant? Was the Doctor gone now, replaced by this truly alien creature arm in arm with _him?_

Or was it all just a trick of the Master’s?

It had to be—she should have just assumed that from the beginning—but somehow it didn’t feel like one. It felt horribly, horribly true.

Maybe _that_ was part of the trick too, but it still didn’t erase the memories of the Doctor mocking her, the Doctor calling her and Ryan idiots, or the Doctor _kissing_ him—

Despair hit Yaz like a wave while she stood trembling in the dark, unsure of where she was— 

“Yaz?”

Her eyes adjusted—now there was a faint light coming in through the windows of the ballroom—and she saw Kayla in the doorway nervously fidgeting with the collar of her dress.

They both spoke at the same time: “Are you all right?”

Yaz answered first: “I’m fine,” she lied. “Jumped around in time again, that’s all. What about you? Where did you end up?”

“Back upstairs, earlier,” Kayla said shakily. “When we…” She looked at Yaz curiously, as though waiting for her to say something. “What about you?”

Yaz looked away, tried not to flinch, and failed to push away the memory of the Doctor’s words: _“Sorry to see you go… but it’s over.”_

“Just earlier,” she finally answered. “Before we met. Nothing important.”

“Oh.” For some reason, Kayla sounded disappointed. “So you didn’t—”

“There you are!” Ryan joined them with a sigh of relief. “Everyone all right?” When the two women nodded, he gestured to the empty hall behind him. “Looks like the whole house is empty.”

“Everyone’s probably gone home,” Kayla said. “Just a few guests left upstairs who were staying the night, the security staff, and Dad.”

“Were you able to talk to him?” Ryan asked.

She shook her head and glanced at Yaz with that odd expression again. “I never managed to get to him. But if he’s waiting for a delivery, then he’ll be in his study. Come on.”

Kayla led the way through the lightless house. “You’re right,” Yaz said hesitantly as she walked beside her, “you really _can_ navigate this place blindfolded.”

They both laughed nervously. “Something’s about to happen, isn’t it?” Kayla said quietly, taking her hand. “Something really bad.”

There was no point in lying about that: “Yes,” Yaz admitted. “I wish I knew what, but I don’t.” She gave Kayla’s fingers a squeeze.

“And whatever it is,” Ryan added, “I don’t think we have the Doctor to back us up this time.”

Yaz turned to glance at him. She was just barely able to make out his expression in the windowless hallway, but she knew it was probably as uneasy as her own.

What had _he_ seen during that last jump through time?

“This way,” Kayla said, pulling open what Yaz had thought was a mirror on the wall but turned out to also be a door on hinges. “Secret passage. The house is full of them, actually. It’s a shortcut to the study.”

“And I didn’t get to see them on the tour?” Yaz joked, pretending to sound offended.

Kayla’s laugh was much less nervous this time. “I was saving the best for last! Besides, most of them are on the ground floor.”

When they went through the door on the other end of the passage, they found a spacious room with a single lamp illuminating the prone figure of a man on the floor.

“Dad!” Kayla cried, rushing to his side.

“Is he…?” Ryan asked, obviously trying not to say the word they were all thinking anyway.

“No,” she said, breathing a sigh of relief. “Just unconscious. I think I can—”

But her words were drowned out by the sound of every piece of glass in the room exploding. 

None of them were particularly close to the windows, but Yaz still felt a shower of tiny shards of glass sting her hands as she covered her face. 

“What _was_ that?” Ryan gasped.

“There’s light coming from outside,” Yaz said, brushing herself off as much as she could and moving towards the broken windows. She could see, through a row of shrubbery, a metal structure that might have been a greenhouse before all of its walls were destroyed. 

Inside of it, flickering like lightning, was a vaguely-humanoid figure made of light. In a way, it was almost like the Kasaavin, but much less stable in shape and size. Not only that: it had features, though she couldn’t make them out from this distance.

“I’ve seen that before…” Ryan whispered as he and Kayla joined her at the window.

“You’ve what?” 

Before Ryan could answer, however, a screech filled the air. Not a human scream… but a creature’s.

And it was coming from above them.

In the air outside the window were a dozen, maybe more, flying monsters with spindly wings that looked incapable of supporting the weight of their bodies, massive claws, and scythe-like tails. 

One of them shrieked again, which was when Yaz realised that the sound was coming from the gaping mouth… on its _chest._

“Run!” she shouted.

The creatures dove at them, claws outstretched. Yaz grabbed Kayla by the arm and pulled her towards the door.

“I can’t leave him!” Kayla cried, looking back at her father, who was still unconscious on the floor.

But before Yaz could think of a solution—or a reason to run anyway—one of the creatures descended on him and, in only a few seconds, the man was completely gone. 

Devoured.

It was obvious, but Yaz couldn’t help saying it anyway: “It’s too late.”

The ideal route would have been back through the secret passage, but a creature landed in between them, blocking that avenue of escape.

Fleeing through the door back into the main house, Yaz tried to think of a place they could barricade themselves and come up with a plan. The TARDIS was the obvious destination, but it would have involved a long run across an open field. They would never make it that far.

“Where do we go?” Ryan yelled, mostly in Kayla’s direction, but the young woman was still in shock from what she had just witnessed that all she could do was shake her head over and over.

“I don’t… I don’t…” she stammered. 

“You know this house!” Yaz encouraged her. “There has to be somewhere with a strong door!”

“Cellar, maybe?” Ryan suggested.

That seemed to bring Kayla back to her senses, at least a little. “Back towards the kitchens,” she said.

“Well, after this evening, we certainly know how to get _there,”_ Ryan joked.

It wasn’t as easy as they’d assumed: the house was massive and after running without an initial destination and in the dark, Yaz wasn’t sure where they were at the moment.

They skidded to a halt at the intersection of two hallways. 

“Which way?” Yaz asked, but Kayla was still wide-eyed with terror. “Come on, stay with me—” she began, trying to get to focus again, but another screech interrupted her.

It barely seemed to fit in the narrow corridor, but it was still moving towards them at a speed that they wouldn’t be able to outrun for long. 

“Over here, there’s a—” Kayla said, but what happened next was a blur: she went one way, Yaz went another, and then the creature’s massive bulk crashed into them, separating them and throwing Yaz back into Ryan and sending them both to the ground. 

Red eyes loomed over them; Yaz couldn’t tell who was screaming, but she suspected that it was her and Ryan _and_ the creature all at once as she braced herself for what she hoped was a quick demise— 

There was a horrible pain on her chest, right below her collarbone, like an electric shock… and then the monster recoiled with a hiss and scrambled back the way it had come. 

But before Yaz could fully comprehend that she might not be about to die after all, she looked down the hall and saw another one of the creatures advancing on Kayla, trapping her against one of the walls, cut off from any avenue of escape.

Her face was just visible, which meant that Yaz could meet her eyes for a single moment before the creature leapt, its prey shrieked, and then there was silence.

 _“Kayla!”_ Yaz screamed, but it was far too late.

* * *

In spite of the vast potential they knew was hiding inside of them, they were still reasonably sure that they weren’t Reaper-proof, especially against the number that encircled them, blocking every possible avenue of escape.

_What do I do now?_

_“Sense a good meal, do you?”_ they scoffed. _“The source of your little paradox, easy pickings—no.”_ They smiled. _“No, wait… you_ _need_ _me, don’t you? I’m not the entrée, I’m the_ _chef_ _: wherever I go, you can break free of the Vortex and feed on whatever you get your little claws on.”_

_Maybe there’s another way._

They reached out a hand, beckoning to a Reaper that was prowling around nearby. _“Shh… shh… easy now,”_ they whispered, drawing closer. _“I’m not food, I’m a_ _friend_ _…”_

Hesitantly, the Reaper stilled, its red eyes glowing in the dark. 

_“There we are,”_ they murmured, giving the Reaper an affectionate scratch on the head between two of its three forehead ridges. _“See? We can be friends… even help one another.”_ They laughed softly. 

_Ooo… interesting laugh. Do I want to keep it? It definitely sends a certain kind of message, doesn’t it?_

_Is that the sort of person I am?_

_And am I the sort of person who makes offers like this: “Follow me,”_ they told the Reapers, _“and you’ll have a feast wherever you go. I promise.”_

_I could go anywhere without fear… I would never have to run away… I’ll never be threatened or in danger._

_There are still all those little people who’ll be Reaper snacks—and they’re all little people compared to me—_

They smiled a new kind of smile.

_…well, I can think of all sorts of places that could use a good scrubbing. Of course, it’ll just be the ones who deserve it. I’ll make sure of that._

_I’ve only just begun to discover what I’m capable of._

_All of time and space is out there, waiting for me to put my mark on it… every single star is calling to me, begging me to make everything better… and I’ll do it, of course I’ll do it…_

They laughed again, feeling the sound lock into place: a heady mixture of joy and triumph, with the slightest edge of cruelty.

_…whether they like it or not._

_This is only the beginning. I can’t wait to see what happens next._

_I love being me so much. I never want it to stop._

_And if I have my way, it never will._

* * *

Backwards: Yaz standing over a cutting board full of onions while tears streamed down her face—

Forwards: the same tears on her face, but she could barely feel them as she ran down a dizzying maze of hallways, staircases, ornate room after ornate room—

Backwards: a tray of champagne flutes shattering on the floor— 

Forwards: Ryan gasping in pain—another headache, she assumed—

Sideways: looking through the doors to the ballroom where the dinner took place, but this time the tables were empty. The only person in the room stood at the far end, backlit by a spotlight, their face cast in shadows, laughing and laughing, triumphant and cruel all at once— 

Backwards: Kayla popping the cork on the bottle of champagne. Instead of continuing her excited chatter, however, her eyes widened in surprise as she saw Yaz. “Where are—”

Forwards: stumbling into a sitting room upstairs. There were no windows and the door looked sturdy, so Yaz and Ryan used the last of their combined strength to drag a heavy writing desk in front of the door.

“We probably only have a few minutes before we jump through time again,” Ryan panted, collapsing onto the sofa.

Exhausted, Yaz sat down next to him and rested her head on his shoulder… which was when she realised where they were— _when_ they were, more accurately.

They hadn’t been talking about the Doctor at all.

“I can’t believe she’s gone,” she whispered.

“You don’t know for sure,” he said; from the sound of his voice, Yaz could tell that he recognised that this was the second time they had lived through this moment. “All we know is that she disappeared.”

“But you saw what happened…” She began shivering and she felt Ryan’s arm tighten around her. She thought back to those horrible last moments: when one of the creatures was on top of both of them and then turned and fled. “How did _we_ survive?”

“I don’t know…” he said. “I don’t know…”

There were trips with the Doctor that went like that: they would show up in a new place and deal with a new problem… and they would meet new people and then, inevitably, some of them would die. It wasn’t every trip—it wasn’t even most trips—but the fact remained that Yaz had witnessed a staggering number of deaths in the short time she had known the Doctor.

And this time especially… why did it have to happen that way?

Yaz shifted a little in Ryan’s arms and felt something tickle just below her collarbone as she moved. It took her a moment to remember what it was: her key to the TARDIS. 

It was in the exact same spot as the shock she received when face to face with that flying creature.

“The TARDIS keys!” she breathed in realisation. “They protected us somehow—they drove those creatures away.” Her heart sank. “Which is why they attacked Kayla and her father: they didn’t have them.”

Yaz thought back to something else: one of the last time jumps into the past, when she was in Kayla’s room. She wasn’t the only one who had jumped back to that moment: Kayla had as well.

Which meant that she might not be— 

“‘Something around your _neck!’”_ Ryan abruptly gasped. _“That’s_ what she was trying to tell me: it was about the TARDIS keys!”

“Who was?” But the words were barely out of her mouth when Yaz understood. “The Doctor warned you? When?”

“During one of the time jumps,” he said, standing and beginning to pace. “And the headaches I kept having, too: there was a voice that kept saying over and over: _‘you’ve got something around your…’_ but I could never hear the rest.”

“Why would she warn us about that? Even if she knew what was going to happen—”

“It’s a temporal anomaly,” Ryan pointed out. “She probably did, by that point.”

“But it’s not like it would make a difference,” Yaz countered. “We never take them off—”

Her eyes widened. 

If she jumped to the exact right point, if she had just enough time— 

She pulled off the cord that held her key.

“What are you doing?” Ryan asked, alarmed.

“This might not be what the Doctor meant to tell us,” Yaz explained, “but I’m going to do what I can.”

_Any second now…_

“Yaz—”

She blinked and found herself in a dimly-lit hallway of closed bedroom doors, but Yaz barely paid attention to them because there she was: Kayla, with her hands in Yaz’s own and her hazel-green eyes widening in shock.

“Where are we?” she gasped. 

“No time,” Yaz said urgently, putting the cord with the TARDIS key around Kayla’s neck. “Don’t take this off, no matter what you do.”

“I—I don’t understand,” she said, bewildered. “I was trying to get Dad’s attention during that speech and then—”

The final piece of the puzzle fell into place: they hadn’t jumped back in time in the same order. This was a version of Kayla from right before they went to her father’s study and the windows broke and those creatures appeared.

“Keep it out of sight,” Yaz told her. “Don’t let me see it. The version of me you’re about to see doesn’t know about this yet. After we get separated, hide somewhere safe.”

“Yaz, what’s going on?”

But she couldn’t be sure that the plan would even work—maybe things would still happen the way she believed that they had happened—and she only had a moment left before she flashed forwards in time again, so Yaz did the only thing she could think of: leaned in and kissed her.

They were in the middle of a temporal anomaly that was probably tearing the fabric of time to pieces, so Yaz wasn’t sure how long the kiss lasted… but it wasn’t long enough.

* * *

Ryan was back in the corridor outside the ballroom, trying not to collapse onto the dessert cart as another headache pounded in his head and the agonising brilliance around him took its usual form: a figure made of light, trying to tell him— 

_“You’ve got something around your neck…”_

“I _know,”_ he said through clenched teeth. “Why do you keep saying—”

The light faded and he was back in the sitting room where he had taken refuge with Yaz… only she wasn’t there.

A cold wave of dread washed over him. If Yaz had removed her key— 

But he couldn’t finish that horrible thought because an even worse realisation hit him:

He knew what was in the greenhouse. He knew _who_ was in the greenhouse.

It was harder to push aside the writing desk without Yaz’s help, but he managed it in the end, and silently hoped that he could make it to the back of the house without running into any more of those creatures.

His wish was granted, but that wasn’t a good thing, because every one of those flying gargoyles had now taken up a position around the greenhouse. They largely ignored Ryan as he passed them; in fact, a few of them shied away if he got too close. Instead, their attention was fixed on the figure in the center of the structure, surrounded by streaks of light crackling over every surface and even through the air itself.

After a few meters’ walk, Ryan realised that it wasn’t lightning, but something more like jagged rips suspended in midair.

Reality was beginning to tear itself apart.

 _No Doctor, no Yaz, no plan…_

But what else could he do?

Ryan steeled himself and headed for the greenhouse door.

* * *

They could see the change in the Reapers’ demeanor: no longer circling them like prey, but watching expectantly: as though they were waiting for something.

_Me. They’re waiting for me._

_They’re waiting for my orders._

_Oh, this will be fun, won’t it?_

Around them, the energy of the temporal paradox continued to tear at the fabric of space-time, and it only took a thought to make those fissures grow.

_I can crack this world wide open._

And on the other side was… well, whatever they wanted. Wherever they wanted to go.

_There… I can feel myself coming together. I have a path now, and once I begin I’ll know who I am._

They were so happy that they almost didn’t notice the young man entering the wreckage of the greenhouse.

The name came easily: _“Ryan Sinclair.”_ They couldn’t help laughing a little… or maybe sighing. _“I thought I told you to leave.”_

His eyes widened: yes, he had apparently figured it out. They wondered what exactly he was seeing: were their two halves still switching back and forth? Had they settled into some combination of both of their features? Or was it because it couldn’t be anyone else standing at the center of a massive temporal catastrophe?

_No, not catastrophe. Opportunity._

_That’s the spirit! I’m not a sad person, I’m a happy one, so I should enjoy myself! I’m about to have so much fun!_

“I couldn’t leave without you,” Ryan said.

 _“Of course you can leave without me,”_ they laughed. _“Hell, take the TARDIS if you want.”_ They lifted a hand and watched one of the cracks in the air widen even further. _"_ _Who needs a TARDIS when you can just rearrange the universe into what you want it to be?”_

The ground underneath their feet trembled. Ryan, meanwhile, was knocked down by the growing earthquake. 

“You’re destroying everything,” he cried out. Behind him, one of the walls of the manor house shuddered and began to crumble. “We’re being thrown around in time, Yaz is missing, those creatures are attacking people—”

 _“I warned you, didn’t I?”_ they demanded, feeling their lip curl into a sneer. _“Why don’t you ever listen?”_

“I learned from the best,” Ryan snarked.

_Listen to the way his voice is shaking. He’s so afraid._

_He’s afraid of me._

_He should be._

They hesitated. _Is that what I want?_

 _“You’re too late now anyway,”_ they told him, deciding to save that question for when this was all over. _“This world is collapsing, and once I step through one of these openings, it’ll be over. Ironic, isn’t it? I’m the paradox that’s breaking this world apart and now I’m the only thing holding it together.”_

They laughed, but it didn’t feel especially funny.

_This was supposed to be fun. I’m supposed to be happy!_

_What happened?_

They examined the widening gap in the air and the ruined skyline waiting for them on the other side. _“Look at this,”_ they said. _“This is where it all began: Gallifrey. My home. I was born there—not my two halves,”_ they clarified. _“I mean_ _me_ _._ _I_ _was born there: the dawn of my existence was the moment they first locked eyes at the Academy. And now, here I am, fully formed.”_ They glared at the shattered citadel and then down at Ryan, as though daring him to contradict them.

“Stop this,” he pleaded.

 _“The only way to stop this,”_ they explained, _“is to destroy me. And you can’t do that.”_ They laughed: that beautiful laugh from before, the one so full of joy and triumph and cruelty. _“There’s nothing you can do. You are small and fragile and limited… nothing but a tiny fly to be swatted away. I could unmake you with a blink. Do you think the Doctor was brilliant? Do you think the Master was terrifying? I am so much_ _more_ _.”_

The ground fractured even more, the flagstone of the greenhouse floor opening up into a chasm behind Ryan, blocking his avenue of escape.

“If there’s anything left of the Doctor in you,” he shouted, “then you know this is wrong! You know this isn’t what she would want!”

 _“Who cares what she wanted? She didn’t even_ _know_ _what she wanted! Neither of them did! Which is why I’m here: I can do the wanting for both of them and I’ll always get whatever it is that I want! So I’m the one who deserves to live!” _ they snarled. _“Me! Not you, or those two squabbling Time Lords, or anyone else here! I am going to walk across countless worlds, shatter them under my feet and watch the Reapers devour the remains, and I am_ _never_ _going to feel bad about it! Why should I sacrifice myself to save you flies? Why should I be the one to go, huh? Why should it be me?”_

The world around them wasn’t the only thing shaking at the moment, because they didn’t know what was happening to them, or where this loss of control was coming from, or where this flood of words was coming from—especially the ones that they spoke next:

 _“And if I did—if I_ _did_ _decide to save everyone here, how would I even do it?”_ they demanded. _“I don’t know how!”_

Ryan stared up at them as his eyes widened again, this time in something other than fear. 

_How does he know something that I don’t?_

He raised a hand and pointed at a spot just under their collarbone. “You’ve got something around your neck,” he said.

Their fingers flew up to grab the diamond hanging from its chain.

_Of course._

Before they could remember all of their excuses, before they could decide to be cruel or cowardly, before they could think of anything else, they threw the White-Point Star as hard as they could through the gap in the air.

_Time to go home._

The Reapers took to the sky and followed the diamond—now split back into two shards—back to Gallifrey.

The chorus of dozens of leathery wings, a blinding flash of light, and then nothing but quiet.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's kind of a throwaway line, but "the Eleven" was the main antagonist of the _Doom Coalition_ series of Eighth Doctor audiodramas, who later held the distinction of being murdered by three different regenerations of the Master _at the same time._


	6. If You Want to Take Me for a Ride

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: there is a quote from the Classic Era in this chapter that uses an ableist term.

The Doctor sat up and immediately wished that she hadn’t. Her head was in agony.

Lying next to her on the floor of the greenhouse, the Master groaned in a way that suggested he wasn’t much better off.

“If that was what your version of _‘solving a problem for both of us’_ looks like,” she said drily, “I think I preferred it back when you were trying to murder me.”

“It was worth a shot,” he protested, and then added scornfully: “You’ve _intentionally_ tried to destroy the Earth with less catastrophic results.”

The Doctor frowned in confusion for a moment before she noticed that he had the same expression. “You replied for me,” she said warily.

“I insulted myself on your behalf, apparently.”

“We’re still connected—”

“We’re still _very_ connected.” He brought a hand up towards his face and then glared at her. “Scratch your own nose.”

Startled, she realised that her nose _was_ itching.

“Wouldn’t it be ironic if this whole _‘solution’_ of mine ended up tying us even closer together than we were before?” the Master asked.

They both laughed quietly, but not quite simultaneously. “Sounds like our kind of irony.” She tried to give him a shove out of her mind, but hissed in pain and had to abandon the effort. Dizzy, she lay back down—practically on top of him.

“Take it easy,” he said irritably as they both tried to reposition themselves and ended up semi-accidentally snuggling instead. “We’ve got to let go slowly—”

“—otherwise the psychic trauma could seriously injure us,” the Doctor finished. She put her head in her hands and groaned in frustration. “Tampering with a White-Point Star? What were you _thinking?”_ she demanded.

“You’re still in my head, you could just _check.”_

She was actually trying her best to _not_ do that. “You should have told me what you were planning and I could have either explained why it was a rubbish idea or helped you with it so that it wouldn’t blow up in our faces like it just did.”

“If you’ll recall,” the Master pointed out, “it was our inability to have a straightforward conversation that started this whole mess in the first place.”

“Which mess are you referring to?”

He shrugged. “Pick one. We’ve got loads to choose from.”

“I’m having trouble thinking of a time when we _didn’t.”_ She made a tiny snort of amusement. “Which is quite the feat, considering I have both of our memories to draw on at the moment.”

“You know,” he murmured in her ear, “it’s actually weird not being a part of you anymore.”

She felt the same way—not that it was easy to _not_ feel the same at this precise moment—and the temptation to hang on, to not let go, was disconcertingly strong. 

Fortunately, there were other ways to push him away: “Isn’t that what caused you to destroy Gallifrey?” the Doctor asked. “Because there was a part of me in you… inside every Time Lord—ow!” Her hand flew to her ear. “Did you just _bite_ me?”

His wicked grin was briefly interrupted by a wince of pain. “Yes, but if it’s any consolation, I felt that too. We’re still connected.”

“Why did you feel the need to do that?”

“Impulse, mostly. It’s like kissing, only there’s a winner.”

She scooted out of range. “You got that line from _my_ memories, you know.”

“They’re much racier than I thought they would be. I’ve never heard of someone’s TARDIS trying to snog them before.”

There was no dignified response she could give to _that,_ so she didn’t.

They lay there in silence for a few minutes. Judging by the colour of the sky, it was nearly sunrise: the very end of the period that the TARDIS had detected the surge of temporal energy.

Through the cracked panes of glass, the Doctor could see someone moving around inside the house: Monty, looking bewildered, before leaving the room and heading further into the house.

_Things have reset, mostly. Some broken glass, but nothing shattered. Yaz and Ryan are all right—in fact, they’ll probably be here soon, so we need to break this connection quickly._

The Master didn’t seem to have overheard her train of thought. “If it was really us doing all of those things,” he said abruptly as he pushed himself up into a seated position, “does that mean that Harry and Jenny are dead? That they died when the watches opened?”

The Doctor shifted uncomfortably and sat up as well. “What do you think?”

“No—well, not exactly,” he amended. “I don’t think we got it entirely correct earlier: they’re not just us pretending, but they’re not _not_ us either.”

She nodded and pretended not to notice the slight twitch of the Master’s jaw as he tried not to mirror her. “I’ve got a theory about why they haven’t faded the way that our past regenerations do.”

“It’s because we need them to not fade away,” he answered.

“You peeked. That’s cheating.”

“And you really expected me to pass that opportunity up?” 

She managed to keep from smiling; this wasn’t the time for it. “We can’t pin all of the snogging and heartache on them, unfortunately. The way that we feel about one another… those are _our_ feelings. But because it’s so close to how _they_ felt—feel—about one another, there’s overlap. And it’s a necessary overlap: I think we need them to act as a boundary between us. We need room to navigate around one another, otherwise we get lost inside our history and lives. Without them there, being a buffer, we would eventually turn into what we became tonight. Not literally—”

“Well, you never know with us. Might be literal.”

“—but we would wind up just as monstrous.”

“‘Monstrous’?” He crossed his arms over his chest. “Not sure if you can feel this, but I’m a bit offended.”

“I thought you would have taken it as a compliment. You were certainly the one in the driver’s seat tonight.”

Unexpectedly, he was still incredulous. _“Excuse_ me?”

“Oh, come on,” she scoffed, “we were face to face with an extremely dangerous enemy and immediately tried to _ally_ with it—do you really think you weren’t in control?”

“I think that was _you_ trying to pick up yet another stray,” he countered.

“We almost went full omnicidal-maniac—which is very _you.”_

“Please,” he snorted, “it sounded more like the beginning of an extremely self-righteous crusade. Which one of us does _that_ describe?”

She winced.

“Ooo, I felt that,” the Master whispered. “What was _that_ about?”

She didn’t want to talk about it, but he was probably willing to badger about it until she elaborated—plus, there wasn’t much else they could occupy themselves with at the moment. “When you were Missy, you offered me that army of Cybermen, saying that I could go fix everything with it—”

“Well, sort of. But go on.”

“And you were right that I _wanted_ to use that power—”

He raised his eyebrows in amusement. “You never say that I’m right.”

“Shush. Let me finish. I almost always _want_ to use that power—and I _know_ that I have so much power, even on my own—but I always hold back. I keep myself from going too far.”

To her relief, he didn’t ask why. “And?” he prompted.

This next bit was a bit excruciating to say: “When we were… them… just now, there was that same impulse to fix things, but instead of holding back—”

“You had me there with you, whispering at you to _do it.”_ He grinned, and she could feel the corners of her mouth twitching into a smile as well. “See, this is why we’d make a fantastic team.”

“More like a _terrible_ team.”

“Why can’t it be both? You could have someone convenient to blame all of your little power trips on, for one thing.”

He was teasing her, trying to avoid the reality of how close they had actually come to disaster—to losing themselves entirely—and she wasn’t in the mood for it. “We would have torn the universe to pieces like we almost did a few minutes ago,” the Doctor pointed out.

“But then we changed our minds at the last minute in a tragically noble act of self-sacrifice.” He rolled his eyes in mock-annoyance. “You _always_ ruin things when they’re at their most exciting point.”

“Because Ryan was there. If he hadn’t been…” She shivered.

Even though most of her jumbled-up recollection of their time fused together was a blur of out-of-control emotions (and a beautiful golden feeling of _not-alone_ that she didn’t want to examine too closely now that it was over), there had still been a small part of her—probably of both of them, despite the Master's grumbling that she had ‘ruined’ it—that couldn’t stop fighting against it.

“He saved us—” she continued.

“Oh, don’t tell him _that:_ you flatter your pets enough as it is,” the Master complained.

“—because we sent him a clue.” She frowned. “Though I don’t think we were particularly delicate about it. I think we just sort of psychically screamed into the entire time period surrounding the anomaly.”

“It’s a wonder his head didn’t explode in the process.”

“And while it turned out to be a good thing that he _was_ there,” the Doctor said irritably, “the next time you want my attention, warn me so that I don’t put my friends in harm’s way by bringing them along.”

The Master scoffed. “You don’t need to pretend with _me,_ you know: I know that’s not what really has you worried.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked warily.

“You’re not afraid _for_ them. You’re afraid _of_ them—of what they’ll do when they discover your secret. They might know by now, in fact.”

The Doctor shook her head firmly. “The paradox is resolved. No one will remember the events of tonight but us.”

“And isn’t that convenient for you?” he said icily. “They won’t remember anything they saw, or learned… or heard. Especially poor Yaz.”

Her temper flared as she thought back to that horrible dance, when Yaz tried to break through to her and was shut out. “That was cruel, even for you,” the Doctor snapped.

“Excuse me?”

“The things you said to her—”

His eyes narrowed in anger. “Oh no,” the Master hissed, “you don’t get to pin this on me. That was both of us—in fact, some of the _really_ brutal lines were all yours.”

The Doctor flinched. She didn’t want him to be correct… but it didn’t change the fact that he was. She had broken too many hearts that weren’t her own:

Donna begging for her life: _“Don’t make me go back. Doctor, please, please don’t make me go back!”_

Martha’s sad farewell: _“Because while he was around, she never looked at anyone else. And I told her, I always said to her, time and time again, I said, ‘get out.’ So this is me, getting out.”_

Snapping at Charley, who followed him into another universe: _“You silly little girl, do you think I want you here?”_

Bill’s words, filtered through a Cyberman’s voice box: _“I waited for you…”_

Breaking Amy’s faith in him: _“I took you with me because I was vain. Because I wanted to be adored.”_

Destroying Ace’s faith too: _“She’s an emotional cripple. I wouldn’t waste my time on her unless I had to use her somehow.”_

Clara pleading with him to stay: _“Stop it. You’re saying goodbye. Don’t say goodbye!”_

And his flippant response to Rose’s declaration of love: _“Quite right, too.”_

Rose thought she was one of the special ones. They all did. 

And they all were: every single person who ever set foot in the TARDIS was special. Important. Brilliant.

“You can’t keep this up forever, you know,” the Master continued. “Eventually they’ll find out and then you’ll have to do the thing you hate most: disappoint someone.”

“That’s not true,” she protested.

“I’m still in your mind.”

“Not as much as you think you are.”

“Didn’t it feel good when it was happening, though?” he asked, his expression softening a little bit. “To not have any more secrets to keep?”

“Sometimes secrets are a mercy.”

“And wasn’t it nice to not have to worry about being merciful?” He took her hands in his. “We really are incredible together.”

She pulled away. “That’s not a good thing,” the Doctor said, looking away.

“Why? Tell me why.”

There wasn’t a good way of explaining it, so she decided to go with the worst one she could think of: “If I let myself feel all of the things that I _could_ feel about you…” No, she couldn’t finish that sentence. She shook her head. “Imagine a situation where you were in danger, where I was in danger of losing you, where I didn’t have any other choice…”

“That level of peril is an average Tuesday for me,” the Master pointed out.

“I nearly tore apart the Web of Time to save Clara,” she said quietly. “Imagine what I’d do for you.”

He looked a little shaken. “Throwing yourself into the line of fire isn’t new for you, Doctor.”

“That’s not what I’m talking about. The exact opposite, in fact: I could make what you did to Gallifrey look like a tea party by comparison.”

“Wouldn’t mind seeing that,” he joked, but his expression was still unnerved. “Murderous rage probably looks good on you.”

“If we stayed like this, we’d bring out the worst in one another.”

“Doesn’t seem like much would change for me.”

“Yes, it would,” the Doctor insisted.

“I kill for you all the time—half of the atrocities I’ve committed were just to get your _attention.”_

He still didn’t understand. “But picture that scenario from before with the roles reversed,” she explained. “I’m in danger and there’s only one thing you could do about it, something you’ve never been able to do before.”

Now he seemed to recognise the direction she was heading, because his eyes widened in panic as he scrambled for a denial: “Like I said, I—”

“You’d sacrifice yourself to save me,” she said bluntly. “Imagine that: a version of you that would die for me and a version of me that would kill for you. We’d burn down time itself.”

She could picture it, too: the two of them together, something going wrong as usual, and the Master at the mercy of a disaster that was probably his fault to begin with, only she would tear apart whatever got in her way in order to rescue him and go too far, and then he would try to sacrifice himself to save her, and then she would destroy something else in order to keep him from doing it—and over and over again until there was nothing left of the universe or themselves.

“Then go back with me,” he pleaded. “We can use the Arch and save the universe from ourselves.”

No matter how many times she told him ‘no,’ it never stopped hurting: “I’m sorry,” she said softly.

The Master didn’t look at her while they both got to their feet. “It’s only going to get worse, you know,” he said, surveying the mostly-intact greenhouse. “That’s why I was trying to find another solution: because we keep being drawn together, closer every time… and you’re not wrong that it isn’t exactly a _good_ thing.”

She raised her eyebrows and tried to lighten the mood. “You never say that I’m right.”

“I didn’t. I just said that you weren’t wrong.” He smiled briefly and continued. “I figured we could at least go out on our own terms before we hit some kind of crisis point.”

“I thought you liked crisis points.”

“Only when I’m the one in control of the crisis.” The Master walked to the door and traced one of the cracks in the glass with a finger. “That’s the trouble: we’re losing control.”

_I always hold back. I keep myself from going too far._

Would she even be able to tell if they went too far?

“So,” the Master said, still examining the glass, “does this mean that you’re saying no once and for all? That you wouldn’t ever go back with me?”

_I could just tell him that I never will and he’ll probably stop asking. We could try to move on with our lives._

She couldn’t lie about that either. “I… I need space. And time.”

He turned to her and she saw a tiny ember of hope in his eyes. “That’s what you’ve got a TARDIS for.”

“That’s not funny.”

He grinned and reached for her hand. “Come on, not even a little bit funny?”

“That would be admitting that you were right about something,” she remarked, letting him pull her closer, “and I think the universe would implode if we did that.”

“In the meantime,” the Master said, “Jenny and Harry are going to still be annoyingly persistent about wanting to see one another.” He looked down at their joined hands. “So will we, I suspect.”

They kissed and, for the first time in ages, the Doctor could admit that it was because they both wanted it too.

“I should go see to Monty,” the Master said once their lips parted. “Convince him that he had a lovely evening and that he shouldn’t worry about what happened to that special diamond he’d purchased.” He appeared to reconsider. “Or maybe not that last bit. It could be fun to give him a jewel thief mystery to be excited about.”

“If you live in a house like this one, I think it’s only fair to have a few Agatha Christie-style mysteries crop up once in a while,” she agreed as she followed him out of the greenhouse. “Did I ever tell you about the time—”

“I’m not one of your pets,” he scoffed. “You don’t need to namedrop with me. Besides,” he added, “thanks to you, I was stuck on Earth without a TARDIS for most of the 20th century.”

“And?” the Doctor asked, annoyed at being interrupted before she could launch into the story.

“For fun, I used to pretend to be an usher for performances of _The Mousetrap_ in the West End and spoil the ending for people during intermission.”

“You really _are_ evil, aren’t you?”

He cackled. “I murder a tenth of the human population of Earth and you practically ask me to move in with you, but I ruin a piece of human fiction and _now_ I’m a villain?”

“Oh, shush.” Ryan and Yaz would be along any minute and she’d had enough awkward conversations in the last twelve hours to last her another regeneration at least, but the Doctor couldn’t help slipping in one last remark: “You know,” she joked, “this utter disaster certainly showed that any child of ours would be a menace to everyone and everything around them.”

The Master was quiet for a moment, looking contemplative. “What?” the Doctor demanded.

“We’re not being careful,” he said.

She frowned in confusion. “When are we ever careful?”

“No, I mean we’re not careful when we meet up. If we keep this up—”

“I can cover my tracks,” she reassured him. “Besides, if we stick to meeting at your TARDIS—”

“You’re being intentionally dense about this,” he said impatiently. “If we keep this up, if we continue _not being careful,_ then this hypothetical child situation might get extremely _not-_ hypothetical.”

Her eyes widened. “Oh.” The odds were low—certainly much lower than other species, like humans—but it was still _possible._

“And I don’t know about you,” he said, “but _that_ would be a complication I’d rather avoid.”

“Agreed,” the Doctor said hastily.

“Besides, we might have bigger problems to worry about.”

That set off about a dozen alarm bells in her mind. “What do you mean?”

His expression grew unsettled. “Can you feel it too?” he asked. “The way that time’s starting to swirl around us?”

The Doctor wanted to tell him that he was just imagining things, that he was just making everything about himself as usual… but it wasn’t a lie worth telling.

She nodded. “Something’s coming,” she said quietly. “Something big.” She didn't know what it was, but she could feel it there, waiting on the horizon like a storm cloud.

“Well, maybe this one won’t be our fault.” He gave her a tiny wave and headed for the main house. 

“Goodbye, Harry,” she said.

He turned back with a rueful smile. “See you later, Jenny.”

Apparently he managed to avoid running into them, because when Yaz and Ryan exited through the kitchen door, they didn’t mention the Master at all.

* * *

“I really wish I knew where my shirt ended up,” Ryan sighed, examining his ill-fitting shirt, which was missing a button for some unknown reason. “It wasn’t where I’d left it.”

“Same,” Yaz agreed, still confused over how she had gone from pretending to be on the catering staff to waking up in a dress and makeup.

“The wardrobe’s downstairs,” the Doctor reminded them.

Ryan exhaled in relief and practically ran from the control room.

“What about you?” the Doctor asked Yaz.

“I don’t mind it,” she replied. “Besides, it has pockets.”

The Doctor looked confused. “Do they not normally?”

Ryan seemed to be taking his time finding a new shirt, and typically Yaz would have been thrilled to have some time alone with the Doctor—thrilled, and also slightly nervous and eager to say or do something that would inspire that incredible smile and that look which made Yaz feel like she was the only person in the universe— 

But something was different. Not in a bad way—it was still great travelling with the Doctor and being part of the “fam”—but it was as though a spell had been broken and Yaz was no longer able to idolise the Doctor in the way that she once did.

She felt… lighter, somehow. For the first time, she was able to think about the possibility of a life without the Doctor and not feel like she was about to be torn apart.

“Do you remember what—” Yaz started to ask, but was interrupted by her mobile chiming.

It was a text message from a name she didn’t recognise but had been saved to her phone’s contacts: 

_“Hi, this is going to sound suuuuper weird, but I guess I blacked out last night because I don’t remember anything and then woke up with only two clues about what happened: a key around my neck and a text from a really cute girl wearing one of my dresses.”_

Yaz reached for her collar as she realised that her key to the TARDIS was missing.

Her phone chimed again with a new message: _“So if I did something embarrassing I’m really really sorry but maybe I was an excellent hostess and this key is to something really special?”_

Yaz scrolled up and saw that she had apparently sent this “Kayla” person an emoji of a winking face blowing a kiss.

She tapped on the picture in her contacts to see if this stranger looked familiar—she didn’t, but it _did_ answer the question of why Yaz might have sent her that particular emoji.

“Everything all right, Yaz?” the Doctor asked.

“Yeah,” she said, staring down at her phone and feeling strangely nervous about how to reply to this very peculiar set of text messages. “Everything’s great.”

 _“You loaned me a dress with pockets,”_ she typed, _“so even if you did do something embarrassing, I’d have forgiven you for that reason if nothing else.”_

After a moment’s hesitation, she added a winking emoji.

The reply from Kayla came almost immediately: another emoji, the one grinning. _“So what DID we get up to last night?”_

 _“Well, it’s actually kind of a weird story,”_ Yaz began, _“because I don’t remember it either.”_

* * *

“So let me get this straight,” the Doctor said as she entered the coordinates of their destination. “We’re going to Somerset.”

“Yes,” Ryan said.

“In 2022.”

“Yes.”

“Because Yaz has to return a dress.”

 _“Yes.”_ Ryan was practically laughing at this point.

After pulling the lever to send the TARDIS into the Vortex, the Doctor turned to look at Yaz, who was busy typing something on her phone. “But you want us to pick you up later instead of waiting for you there?”

“Yup,” Yaz replied with a grin.

The TARDIS materialised outside of Tolland Manor much closer to the house than it had been on their last trip. 

“Thank you so much, Doctor!” Yaz exclaimed as she headed for the door, grabbing a garment bag on her way out.

“Wait, when are we picking you up?” the Doctor asked, still bewildered about why Yaz and Ryan had exchanged so many amused glances ever since they showed up at the TARDIS.

“Not sure,” Yaz said. “I’ll text you.”

“What?”

“I’ll explain it to her,” Ryan assured Yaz.

“Thanks,” she replied, obviously relieved for some reason. “How do I look?”

“I’m not the one whose opinion you’re after,” he said with a snort of laughter, “but I think it’ll go over well. Good luck.”

“What was all that about?” the Doctor asked after the door closed behind Yaz.

“You really didn’t notice?” Ryan said, still snickering. “Doctor, she was wearing makeup.”

“What?”

“And her hair was doing a thing.”

The Doctor tried to remember. “It was?”

“And she was in a really nice dress.”

“Wait, that wasn’t the dress she was returning— _oh…”_ she gasped as she finally understood. “Oh. Well, that’s, er, exciting, I suppose?” She hastily turned back to the console and entered the coordinates for Sheffield. “Where to next? I was thinking we could pick up Graham and head to… what?” she asked, noticing that Ryan’s expression had grown hesitant. “Should we wait for Yaz before we decide?”

He fidgeted with his sleeves. “Er… well, Graham and I had dinner plans tonight.”

“Brilliant!” she exclaimed. “Where are we going?”

Now he looked even more uncomfortable. “It’s…” He sighed. “It’s my Nan’s birthday. Would have been her 65th.”

Her hearts sank a little. “Oh. I see.”

For a moment, she wanted to invite herself along anyway—she _had_ known Grace, after all—but this wasn’t her grief, not in the same way that it was for Grace’s husband and grandson. It wasn’t her place to intrude on that. Besides, if they’d wanted her to join them, they would have asked, and they hadn’t.

So the Doctor pretended to occupy herself with the TARDIS controls until they reached their destination. “Say hi to Graham for me,” she said awkwardly. 

“I will,” Ryan confirmed as he headed out. “Have a good night, Doctor.”

Now alone in the TARDIS, she patted the console. “Looks like it’s just you and me, then.” 

The Doctor waited, hoping that perhaps the TARDIS would activate an alarm that would give her something interesting to do, but there was nothing—except for herself, her thoughts, and the beginnings of a questionable decision.

“Is it the apocalypse yet?” the Master drawled when he answered the phone.

“Do you want to have dinner?” she blurted out. 

“Maybe,” he replied, obviously trying to sound casual and not _quite_ managing it. “Are you buying?”

“Aren’t you the one with the fancy investment adviser job?”

“That’s Harry, not me.”

She leaned back against the console. “Well, then maybe I want to have dinner with Harry instead.”

“Only if you’re bringing Jenny along.”

“Fine.”

“Did you have a destination in mind?” he asked; she could hear him activating something on his TARDIS in the background.

The Doctor looked up at the ceiling in the hopes that it would provide some kind of inspiration. “How about… Paris during the Belle Époque—ooo, or maybe the Third Belle Époque in the 26th century. Haven’t been there in awhile.”

“Hmm…” he mused. “The fashion’s better in the former but the drinks are better in the latter.”

“Should we flip a coin, then?”

“You probably know fewer humans in the 26th century,” the Master concluded. “I’ll be somewhere between 2509 and 2532—have fun tracking me down before I manage to impersonate someone influential and alter the course of human history.”

“I thought Jenny and Harry were the ones who were having dinner together,” she pointed out.

“Oh, they are,” he agreed, “but you can’t expect me to not have a little fun while waiting for the two of you to show up, can you?”

“This is just dinner,” the Doctor reminded him.

He laughed. “Is that what you really think?”

It wasn’t: it was actually an incredibly reckless idea that would likely just blur the lines between them and their human counterparts even more. It was entangling their own lives together in a way that would only bring them closer to the inevitable catastrophe that she warned him about during their most recent conversation. It was a disaster waiting to happen.

But if either of them had ever played it safe or only made good decisions, they never would have left Gallifrey to begin with.

_Come on, what’s the harm in enjoying yourselves for a few hours?_

“You’ll just have to wait and see, won’t you?” she asked, and ended the call.

“All right, old girl,” the Doctor informed the TARDIS. “You get to work looking for temporal anomalies in the early 26th century. Meanwhile…” She removed her coat and headed for the stairs. “I’m going to go find a clean tuxedo.”

* * *

_Jenny Smith and Harry Jones will return in "Strength in Numbers": a multi-timeline crossover event coming in Spring 2021._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here we are at the end! Thanks for reading, everyone. 
> 
> As noted above, I have a Big Story in the works, though it'll take me a few months to complete it since I have a few other WIPs to update. _Strength in Numbers_ will, however, probably be the final story in the _Two Can Play At That Game_ series aside from one or two epilogue one-offs. This has been a fantastic ride and I'm blown away by how kind everyone has been throughout. 
> 
> I'm excited to see what tomorrow's new episode is going to bring--it'll be exactly a year since I started writing DW fic. Speaking of, consider checking out my other DW fics if you haven't yet, as they're pretty much All Spydoc Drama All The Time and if you're reading this you're probably into that sort of thing. :) 
> 
> Happy New Year, everyone. For all of us stuck on the slow path together, may 2021 be an easier road than the one we walked this past year.

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone! I just spent the last few months finishing up my graduate degree, so I had academia on my mind and thought "wouldn't it be funny if the Doctor and the Master had to go to an alumni reunion event at St Luke's?" 
> 
> I'll be posting one chapter per day, with the intention of having the whole thing up by the time the New Year's special airs.
> 
> Heads up: this story's going to get _weird._


End file.
